


SHAME

by taotu



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, SKAM (France), SKAM (Norway)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, Coming Out, Copious Amounts Of:, Drinking, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Mental Illness, Recreational Drug Use, Sexual Content, Swearing, skam au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-19
Updated: 2019-08-09
Packaged: 2020-07-08 13:34:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 82,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19870477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taotu/pseuds/taotu
Summary: There were Isak and Even, Lucas and Eliott, Matteo and David… and now, Sirius and Remus.Or, alternatively: Sirius has some figuring-things-out to do. He’s not sure if Remus helps or makes things worse.





	1. The averse hallucinogenic effects of smoking kale

**Author's Note:**

> WOWZER so I have been working on this story now for two whole-ass months. The biggest of thank-yous to [jennandblitz](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jennandblitz/pseuds/jennandblitz) for her incomparable beta skills and support!  
> I also commissioned [this gorgeous art](https://bringblackback.tumblr.com/post/186356033488/art-by-urcheekbones-coughs-clears-throat) from [urcheekbones](https://urcheekbones.tumblr.com) just for this story because I needed to see Sirius and Remus come to life.  
> If you happen to fall upon this with no idea what SKAM is, this is just a Wolfstar high school AU. ;)  
> MASSIVE CREDITS to Julie Andem and the other SKAM creators — this fic is *heavily* inspired, and they created a show that I just couldn’t possibly NOT iterate on myself because I loved it too much.  
> Will post a chapter each MWF – tags apply to the overarching fic, not the individual chapters. FYI: Sirius is 17/18 and Remus is 19, for those squicked by blurry age lines.  
> I hope you love it <3

**SATURDAY 22:54**

Sirius sits cross-legged on the kitchen counter between a half-empty box of Shreddies — hand in said box — and a bottle of washing up liquid. His other hand is wet with the condensation from his fourth beer, but not cold as it’s been hours since the ice in Mary’s bathtub melted, leaving the already watery beer to bob like aimless buoys in a lake of lukewarm bathwater. The window above the sink is open, blowing a cool, if damp, breeze up the back of Sirius’ shirt, alleviating the stick of the fabric against his skin. Mary’s flat is packed with sweating, drunk, gyrating, shouting bodies, the moving atoms of whom all contribute to curling the frontmost locks of Sirius’ hair inelegantly with humidity, making them fall into his eyes and obscure his vision. To his right, leaning against the counter, James chain-smokes his way through another cigarette, and to his left, Peter, with Benjy’s arm slung around his shoulders, gazes with gutless fascination upon the pink-purple-orange lit living room beyond.

Peter is muttering, “Her tits in that top —”

Sirius’ lashes flutter as he rolls his eyes. “If you’re going to spend another pathetic night within a five-foot radius of girls, staring at them and talking about them and not _to_ them, Pete, I’m going to —”

“Let’s not get hypocritical,” mutters James around his cigarette, face lit pale fluorescent blue by the screen of his phone, held a bit too close to his nose.

Benjy roughly pats the back of Peter’s head, supposedly in consolation. Peter doesn’t look too happy about it, not with the way his eyes momentarily bug out of his head. “The man speaks the hard truth, but he speaks for all of us,” sighs Benjy.

“A fucking generalisation if I’ve ever heard one,” James shoots back, bespectacled eyes traversing the three. “Give me two minutes alone with Evans and —”

“She’ll grace you with another handprint-shaped bruise on your cheek,” Benjy laughs, shaking Peter’s shoulder vigorously. “Do you remember that? That was dead embarrassing, mate, and then at school Mary offered to help you cover it with her makeup, and you, being Head Wanker of the Associated Association of Wankers, fucking said _yes_ , and neither of you stopped for a second to consider that Mary’s pale as shit —”

“Yeah, thanks, Ben, you’re quite finished.” James locks his phone and stuffs it into his pocket. He meets the gaze of Sirius, who can only smirk at the deadpan look on James’ face. The longer Sirius smiles, the more he wears down James until he too, with reluctance, cracks a smile. “Anyhow, I don’t know whose tits Pete meant, but I’m willing to bet you couldn’t march up to the bird and bag her, either, even with all your wiles.”

“My wiles,” Sirius echoes through a chuckle. “I think that’s a dare, is it not, gentlemen?” For a moment he bites at the dry skin on his lower lip, eyes scanning the hazy, indulgent swarm of dancers. Then he stuffs a handful of Shreddies in his mouth and washes it down with the last of his beer. “Who is it, Pete?”

“You’re really going to shred apart his wee fantasies, aren’t you, Sirius?” Benjy rubs Peter between the shoulder blades. “If you’d just hand me that dishtowel, Pete, I’d be glad to be your shoulder to cry on.”

Peter knees Benjy in the bollocks. Benjy grimaces and cups his crotch, but with the numbness of someone who rather often is kneed in the bollocks. “You’re both bastards,” says Peter. For a moment he’s cross, but then he leans back into Benjy’s side. “The brunette there, with the tartan skirt.”

James adjusts his glasses and squints. “With no bra on?”

“That’s the one,” sighs Peter.

“Bit on the small side,” murmurs Benjy.

“What is?” Sirius arches a brow.

“Her tits.”

“I don’t discriminate,” Peter huffs. “A nice handful is —”

“As if you know what size tit fits in your fucking hand.”

“And if your cock fits, Pete, that’s no indicator. You’ve small hands.”

Sirius breathes, “Fuck’s sake.” _This mammary-talk will kill me._ He hops off the counter, plucks the cigarette from between James’ lips to take a drag, returns it to its rightful place — James’ eyes cross in the process — and then heads off into the living room. Benjy hollers a _hoooooohhhh_ after him, smacking out a drumroll against the kitchen counter.

Sirius shoulders past the girl in the tartan skirt. Bro code — he’s not a bloody monster. But a dare is a dare, if unofficial and self-inflicted, so he tries to put on his superficial James-goggles to seek out a girl as or more unattainable than Tartan Skirt. His eyes skate past Evans, _no_ , and Mary, _triple no_ , and hone in on the girl between them. Leggy, dark-skinned, doe-eyed. He affects a smile. Evans looks somewhere between wary and repulsed when she sees Sirius approach, but Doe Eyes is more welcoming, and Mary looks like she’ll smile so hard her teeth crack under all the gritting. “Hi Sirius!” she shouts, piercing even over the music.

“Hey, what’s up.” He doesn’t look at Mary, and Doe Eyes bites her lower lip.

She has him against the wall in the hallway, tongue in his mouth. Doe Eyes has several inches on him but she doesn’t seem to mind, or enjoys it, rather, leaving marks on Sirius’ jaw with her pointy nails, tasting like tequila without the lime. It’s easygoing, meaning Sirius can handle it, can snog her all she wants and keep up, until those pointed nails brush his lower stomach and the fly of his trousers.

He chuckles uneasily into the girl’s mouth, his hands falling from her back to worm between their bodies, and then Sirius thinks words he honestly believes he’ll never think again — _the cops just saved me._ Because three rough knocks on the front door later, Mary is trapped in her foyer with two police officers. “I have to go,” mutters Sirius, doesn’t look Doe Eyes in her eyes before darting down the hall.

In the living room, the window onto the fire escape is open. Evans is hard at work hounding people out of it. One glance at the kitchen shows his mates are gone, or elsewhere, but when Sirius goes to the window, Evans grabs him by the arm. “Are you leaving, Black?”

Sirius’ brows crinkle. Her grip hurts, _motherfucker_. He doesn’t even get to say _yes_ before she nods, as if to herself. “No, it doesn’t matter. You are.” She fishes a baggie from the pocket of her bloody corduroy pinafore — only Evans wears both corduroy and pinafores to parties — and stuffs it into the bum pocket of Sirius’ jeans.

“Christ, Evans, I understand wanting a fondle, but —”

“Please don’t. You’re leaving now.” She shoves him toward the window. “Keep that safe, alright? I’ll skin you if you lose it. Toady to the police if they try and stop you.”

Sirius frowns at her, feels at the lump in his pocket. Evans? Wants him to hide weed? _Evans?_ It’s a story Sirius will tell his grandchildren. “You didn’t have to be so nice about it,” he’s muttering, and just barely makes it onto the fire escape as the cops set foot in the half-emptied living room. He makes it past the cop cars just outside by strategically camouflaging amidst a gaggle of girls all dressed like Evans in nonthreatening knee socks and modest polo shirts. When he’s made it around the block, he pulls out his phone.

**_Sirius: Where the hell did u all go_ **

**_Benjy: out the window_ **

**_Benjy: should’ve seen it, evans smacked my arse and jamie’s gloriously jealous_ **

**_Peter: We’re on the bus!_ **

**_James: bobbies catch u with ur dick out? ;)_ **

Sirius rolls his eyes.

**_Sirius: Wouldnt u like to know_ **

**_Benjy: send all the details. jamie’s sat next to some old bag. prime time to get him flustered_ **

Sirius pockets his phone. His flat’s only a ten minute walk away. The news of being knighted as Lily Evans’ drug mule is too good to share over text. It can wait.

“Sir, just a moment.”

Sirius glances over his shoulder to see a policewoman striding toward him, her hand raised. She stumbles a bit over a crack in the sidewalk. Before she can regain her footing, Sirius shoots off in a sprint.

**MONDAY 7:30**

It takes Sirius the five hours that he dozes that night to forget he’s a drug mule. He falls asleep in the jeans Evans stuck her weed in, wears them all day the next day — _changes his fucking underwear, yes, god_ — and gets shitfaced with the lads on Sunday night. When they all wake in the Potters’ attic to Peter’s school alarm, phone blaring and echoing in the airy space, Sirius thinks not of the empty baggie on the floor by the bong, but of the empty bag of prawn crisps stuck to Benjy’s cheek as he sits up, bleary-eyed. Sirius laughs himself back down to the floor and falls asleep again. They arrive late to first period English Lit, the only class they all have together.

Sirius is on his way out of Maths, turning the corner toward the courtyard when the truly horrifying sight of Evans striding directly toward him has Sirius stumbling into the wall and bumping his shoulder painfully.

“Black,” Evans says coolly, staring somewhere past his shoulder. Her arms cross tightly over her chest. She’s in corduroy again — a mustard blazer embroidered with beaded flowers.

Sirius just stares, waiting for the punchline, then clears his throat and makes to step past her. “It’s been a pleasure to see you, you’re just — simply enchanting as always, but growing boys must eat —”

Sirius’ chest thuds against her outstretched palm. “Where’s my weed.”

“Your what?” Sirius fixes her with a look of lazy confusion that lasts as long as it takes him to dig absently inside the pockets of his jeans. Nothing. He trains his eyes on the far end of the hall, where the sunlight bleeds in through glass doors with such harsh whiteness that it leaves colourful blobs in Sirius’ vision. _Shit_. “I…”

Evans drags him back toward the wall by the front of his shirt. “Black.”

Sirius looks at her feet. Evans wears oxfords as forest-green as her eyes. Eyes James still rhapsodises about to this day, eyes Sirius would be glad to not have to look upon again for the remainder of his life. His lips fold into a thin line, and then he bursts out, “Why did you trust me?!” in anguish.

Evans pinches the bridge of her nose. “Sometimes making the most obvious choice is the smartest tactic.” She exhales, eyes closed, and Sirius tries not to read into being called _obvious_. “I’m sorry. Did they take you in? What did you tell them? Did you at least say it wasn’t yours?”

Sirius blinks. “Tell who what?”

“The police?”

The laugh overcomes him so fast it’s almost a cough. His recovery is slow, and the dawning of realisation in his eyes is not something Evans should see, but she does. “I — no, I made it past them,” he says, rubbing at the back of his neck.

Evans surveys him with eyes that threaten flaying, castration, or decapitation, which Sirius does not like. “Can I have it, then?”

“Have what?” Sirius’ eyes flicker about the hallway, mapping the route of least resistance to the courtyard, where he can see James, Benjy, and Peter sat on a bench.

Evans doesn’t acknowledge that question. Then, “You smoked all my weed.”

Sirius’ eyes flit to her, wide. “What?! _No!_ No!” he breathes. Her gaze is cold. “I have it. Didn’t touch it. I swear. I just — I don’t have it on me.” When Evans leans into her hip in a stance that makes Sirius’ knees feel unreasonably wobbly, he forces a playful eye-roll. “Come on, Evans. You’re smarter than that. I wouldn’t bring it to school. Sniffer dogs and all that.”

Evans hums disingenuously. “Those were banned over a decade ago.”

Sirius licks his lips. “Right.”

Evans steps closer. She has a ring on her finger, shaped like a fox’s head. Sirius wonders how its imprint might look on his cheek. “Every day starting tomorrow that I don’t get my weed back, Black, you’re further indebted to me.” Then she brushes past him, hiking her bag up her shoulder, and greets the passing Maths professor with an obsequious grin.

Sirius sags against the wall. “It’s your fault,” he mutters at Evans’ retreating back.

**TUESDAY 12:27**

Mary and Evans come upon Sirius and his friends at lunch. Gil ate the entire loaf of bread Sirius bought the prior Friday and there’s no way he’d touch Petunia’s seeded paleo cracker bread substitutes, so all he has to show for himself in the nutrition department is a jar of olives. He’s licking brine from his fingertips when a shadow falls over him. Mary’s smiling face is haloed by the sun.

“Hello, boys!” she chirps.

“Alright, Evans?” asks James, leaning back against a backless bench.

Sirius snorts. 

Evans says nothing, but turns her eyes on Sirius, which is just uncomfortable.

“We’re both fab, thanks,” Mary gushes. Sirius nods, James doesn’t take his eyes off Evans, Peter gawks at Mary, enthralled, and Benjy returns his attention to Clash of Clans. Mary clears her throat. “Right! So, I was, er, wondering if any of you’d thought to join any societies or activities this year? Seeing as I don’t believe any of you did _anything,_ really, last year —”

James slings an arm across Sirius’ shoulders, pats him heartily on the chest. “Sirius is VP of Robotics Soc.”

Mary grins. “Are you? How nice!”

Sirius, meanwhile, turns his head slowly to stare blankly at James’ profile. When James notices, he merely shrugs. “What? You are.”

“Yeah.” Sirius scoffs, tucks his hair behind his ear. “You were saying, Mary.”

“Right! Er, so, Lily and Marlene and Amaline and I decided we’d start a society ourselves this year! And it’s gonna be loads of fun just the four of us, but obviously the more the merrier! We’ve a big, big mission for fall semester and we need all the help we can get. The first meeting’s this Friday, right after last period —”

James laughs, toying idly with the short sleeve of Sirius’ top. “What’s your society?”

“Well, for now we’re just the Gardening Society, but not to worry, James Potter, we’ll think of a cool nickname soon enough! GardSoc would be simple enough, but it hasn’t quite got the same ring as RobSoc…”

Sirius coughs, but Evans shoots dagger through her eyes at them all, so he doesn’t break down in cackles the way Benjy does at the other end of the bench. 

James pushes his glasses up his nose. “Gardening Society,” he deadpans.

“Yes, yes! Alright, I’m willing to admit it sounds lame on the surface, but the Head Teacher let us have free rein over the abandoned greenhouse on the grounds and all the land around it! That greenhouse is _massive_ , James Potter, and while it’ll be a shitload of work to refurbish it, all your work will count as community service to the school, and once the greenhouse is all fixed up, just _think_ of the —”

“Give them the flyers, Mary.” Evans squeezes her friend’s shoulder.

“Ah, flyers, yes.” Mary shoves a neatly-cut leaflet at them each, black ink printed on green paper. “Hope to see you there!” When the Prewett twins saunter past, they magnetise Mary’s eyes. “Oh, there’s the Prewetts — hey, hey, Prewetts!” She jogs after them, a flyer fluttering from her grasp and her heavy shoulder bag slapping against her hip.

Once she’s made it beyond hearing distance, James and Benjy both keel over with laughter. Sirius smiles at his lap. Benjy mimes blowing his nose with the flyer while James crumples it up and tosses it at the nearest bin. He misses, which is unfortunate, as Evans is still three feet away.

“Black, can I talk to you?” she asks. “Alone?” When he hesitates, Evans shakes her head, tongue-in-cheek. “About RobSoc.”

At the mention of RobSoc, the lads tune out, so Sirius nods and hauls himself to his feet. Evans takes him by the elbow, leads him near the bin, where she steps on James’ flyer.

She smiles patronisingly. “My weed.”

Sirius puts his hands on his hips, goes for an easy laugh. “I thought this was gonna be about Robotics.”

“You’re not that daft,” mutters Evans. “Anyhow, since you don’t have it, at least pay up.”

Sirius’ smile falters. “I —”

“Sixty quid.”

Sirius chokes on the back of his tongue. “ _What?_ ”

“Yeah, I also don’t know how you managed it, either. I’m thinking you might’ve dropped half in the sewer, or given it away, which, well. Is just a shame.”

Sirius isn’t listening. _Sixty pounds?_ He blinks at the bin. “Listen, Evans, I don’t… I don’t have that kind of money right now.”

Evans hums thoughtfully. “I figured. See you on Friday, then.”

Sirius exhales, rubs a hand over his jaw. It takes him a second to register Evans’ words, but she hasn’t left yet, eyes trained expectantly on him. “Friday?”

“At the Gardening Society meeting. You, Potter, Pettigrew, Fenwick. You’re all going to be there. And if you aren’t, you’ll start paying double interest weekly.”

Sirius makes a garbled noise, tugs at the front of his hair. “ _Double?!_ You’re fucking raving —” He digs in his pocket, unearthing his bus fare for the afternoon, a fiver, and a broken cigarette. He winces. “Can I pay off eight-point-three percent right now?” He reconsiders the coins. He can walk home. “Ten percent?”

“Do I look like a fucking bank?” Evans squats to the ground, grabs James’ discarded flyer. “This isn’t a loan. You stole from me.” She places the balled-up flyer in Sirius’ upturned palm. “See you at half four in the greenhouse.” The heels of her boots click as she passes. Sirius unfolds the flyer, scowls at the gaudy font of _Gardening Society!_

**FRIDAY 16:41**

The greenhouse smells like fertiliser. Neither the collapsible chairs, most of them empty, the few balloons that have escaped to hug the ceiling, nor the platter of home-baked mini Victoria sponges help to disguise that they’re all sitting in a dirty, neglected glass incubator. The windows are tinged green with mildew, tainting the afternoon sunlight trying to seep in.

It was only yesterday that Sirius mentioned attending the Gardening Society meeting to James, Peter, and Benjy. James had laughed him off until Peter said _Mary’s quite nice, it’d be sad if no one went_ , at which point Benjy said _Is wee Peter in love?_ and Sirius smacked James on the shoulder and reminded him _Evans will be there!_ So he isn’t sure where they stand on the GardSoc front, but it’s eleven minutes post-scheduled start and the only occupants of the greenhouse aside from Mary’s crew are Sirius and a pair of snogging year twelves.

Mary looks to be sweating more by the passing minute. Lily touches her shoulder. “We’ll give it five more minutes,” she says reassuringly, then stalks promptly over to Sirius, who fumbles his phone into his pocket as if he’s just been caught using it during class. “Where are they?” she hisses.

Sirius bites the inside of his lip as he clumsily draws out his phone again.

**_Sirius: Ur all late for GardSoc. Shame on you._ **

“I — I don’t know,” he stammers, and Evans gives him the evil eye. His phone buzzes.

**_James: was that today????_ **

Sirius’ nails bite into his thigh.

“Double,” Evans reminds him softly.

“Fuck, I fucking know, alright? Just —”

“Alright, Evans?” James appears behind her, goes for the classic arm-across-her-shoulders, but Evans evades the contact like his arm’s made of slime. James grins nonetheless, and Sirius sits up, smacking James on the side of the thigh and mirroring his smile. Peter takes the seat beside Sirius, sponge cake in hand, and Benjy the one behind him, hands mussing Sirius’ hair. He’s so inundated in relief that he doesn’t even care.

“How good of you to come show your support for the Gardening Society,” Evans intones.

“Always,” remarks James, plopping beside Sirius. “I like to get my hands dirty now and then.” Sirius cringes openly. Evans wanders off toward her friends.

Sirius watches her go, then looks to his both sides. “Really thought you wouldn’t show.”

“We were halfway to the pub when Pete reminded us.” Benjy pats both of Sirius’ shoulders. “You’re lucky Jamie’s a slut for hard-to-get and had us turn right ‘round.”

Sirius turns his sweetest smile on James. “Thanks for being a slut, baby.”

James’ eyes don’t leave Evans. “Fuck right off.”

“Hi, Sirius.” Doe Eyes and a blonde mate of hers traipse past to take seats in the back row. Sirius manages a nod, and then Benjy’s hold on his shoulders turns to iron.

“It’s her, yeah? From Mary’s party?” he whispers in Sirius’ ear.

Sirius hums in confirmation.

A low whistle, and then, “Those fuckin’ legs, mate.”

“Remus!” Amaline calls, the sparkly tassels on the hem of her hijab flying as her head whips toward the greenhouse entrance. Her face goes abruptly dark, an expression of distaste of Evans’ glaring caliber. It’s no wonder they’re friends; they must spend their one-on-one time coaching each other in the art. “You’re late.”

The recipient of her glare holds up his hands in surrender. James mutters about Evans’ argyle socks. _Remus_. “I had to go back for my trowel and rake. Take me or leave me.” Remus shrugs with a lift of knobby shoulders.

Amaline tuts. “Don’t you know we _provide_ here at GardSoc?” she says teasingly.

“You can’t say GardSoc! Not yet!” Mary blurts, sticking her forefinger in the air. “We’re voting on the nickname today!”

Amaline eyes Mary. “For _give_ me, Marybeth, slipped my mind.” She smirks at Remus, smacks at his backpack until he turns away to take a seat.

“Don’t call me Marybeth,” sighs Mary from the background of Sirius’ attention. He watches Remus sit down, bending at his long legs, dropping his backpack to the floor.

“I’ll stop as soon as you stop calling me Amal Clooney.”

“It’s a compliment!”

The green tinge from the mildewed windows isn’t unflattering on the chestnut coiff of Remus’ hair. Sirius doesn’t recognise him, wonders if he’s a transfer like Doe Eyes must be. Not younger, though. He has to be in upper sixth, or he wouldn’t look the way he —

Remus looks his way.

“Welcome to the first meeting of the Gardening Society — nickname pending!” squeals Mary. She’s an excuse for Sirius to break eye contact with Remus, which he needs to and he does, because Remus is smiling faintly and Sirius can’t for the life of him manage to do it back, or understand why he feels compelled to do it back when upon later reflection it might just come off _creepy_.

“We have plenty of cakes left if you didn’t get one! Er, alright, so the school mandates that I go through the student society code of conduct, and while the last thing I want is to bore you all, I’m, like, just the very least bit concerned that the Head’s hidden cameras in this greenhouse, so…”

Mary prattles for a good five minutes about respect. Then she opens the floor to nickname suggestions, writes _GardSoc_ at the top of a whiteboard. While Mary ignores Benjy’s suggestions of _the Bush Trimmers Society_ and _the Vegetable Strokers Society_ , Evans nabs the marker and scrawls _Garden Hoes_ under _GardSoc_. Mary balks when _Garden Hoes_ wins the vote by a landslide _,_ claims it will never be accepted as their official society name, tugged between the parties of democracy and morality. Evans calms her when she explains that they can refer to their society as such by word of mouth only. She turns to her audience in the rickety plastic chairs. “If I hear anyone calling us _GardSoc_ when a teacher isn’t around, you’re cut.”

“That’s a bit harsh, Lily. We’re trying to spread inclusivity,” Mary murmurs.

Evans smiles. “A Garden Hoe can be of any race, religion, sexuality, ability, gender… anything. As long as they’re not boring.”

Mary eyeballs Evans skeptically, then looks down at her phone. “Next on the agenda is… member bonding!” She sets her phone down and claps her hands together. “Okay, okay, last summer I learned this brilliant icebreaker called _Stinger_ …”

Sirius bites his lip, eases onto his feet. “I need to take a piss,” he whispers to no one in particular, slipping out of the greenhouse, doubtless not unnoticed by Evans’ scrutiny.

The sun has set halfway behind the school and the flaky gray clouds paint across the pinkish-orange backdrop. It would take him at least five minutes to walk to the school doors, and if he took long enough in the toilet, a roundtrip of fifteen minutes might time his arrival perfectly for post-icebreaker. He stands there a moment, weighing the probability that the doors will be closed versus the work it would take to walk so far.

He pisses behind a tree beyond the gardening shed, forehead pressed to its half-damp bark. As he zips up and circles the tree, he sees rather quickly that he isn’t alone. Remus leans against the tree’s opposite side, squinting toward the school. He doesn’t even look at Sirius until Sirius himself has taken stock of the situation — how close he’d stood to piss, how the fuck he hadn’t noticed Remus’ arrival.

Sirius is still silent when Remus feels for the joint he’s tucked behind his ear and smiles at him, faint. “They’re doing Two Truths and a Lie instead,” he says.

Sirius, scanning Remus from head to toe, thinks leaning against the tree would be far too close, so he continues to dawdle a few feet away. “And you’re upset because you really wanted to play Stinger?” he says. “Or, no — musical chairs. You stormed out because Mary wouldn’t let you play musical chairs.”

Remus regards him with what Sirius thinks is heavily-veiled curiosity. “Am I so easy to read?”

Sirius just shrugs, looks toward the greenhouse, slides the flats of his hands into his back pockets. He hears a soft chuckle, but only turns again at the smell of pungent smoke. Remus lifts his brows, offers Sirius the joint as he blows out a swirling cloud. When Sirius accepts, forced to step closer to do so, Remus clears his throat. “So what are yours, then?”

Sirius takes a pull, blinks through the smoke dissipating between him and Remus. “My what?”

“Your truths and lie.” Remus pulls his jacket tighter across his shoulders.

“Oh.” _Way to put me on the spot_ , Sirius thinks. He takes another inhale. “Way to put me on the spot,” he says, thoughtless.

Remus’ brows and lips quirk in sync. He takes the joint back from Sirius. “Don’t tell me then.”

Sirius observes him in silence, rocking back and forth on his feet, then sighs dramatically. “I can solve a Rubik’s Cube in under a minute, I… can knot a cherry stem with my tongue… and I can’t swim.”

Remus hums around the joint, tongues his lower lip, then nods at Sirius. “Cherry stem’s the lie.”

“Fuck, mate, how’d you know?” Sirius breathes, stomping his foot into the dry dirt.

Remus shrugs. “I can do it myself.”

“We’ve a show-off on our hands, have we?”

Remus proffers the joint again and meets his eyes but says nothing.

Sirius gazes at the school, which now hides the setting sun. “You’re new this year?” Remus nods. Sirius nods too, rakes a hand through his hair. “But you know Amaline?”

“Mhm.” Remus half-smiles.

Sirius puffs on the joint. “I don’t know, mate, that’s a bit suspicious.”

Remus blinks at him. “You think I’m suspicious?”

Sirius hums affirmatively. “Well, yeah.”

Remus pushes off the tree. “You do realise, then, that you’re smoking a suspicious guy’s suspicious weed.”

Sirius chews on his lower lip, now examining the joint between his fingers. “That’s, well… now that you mention it, that’s bloody concerning, innit?”

Remus nods emphatically. “Worrisome. Harrowing, even.”

Sirius, lips twisting with the effort to fight a smile, breathes out shakily. He makes sure Remus has a hold of the joint before he proceeds to stagger about, clutching theatrically at his chest, his stomach. “What — what have you done to me? What did you do? It’s kale in there, isn’t it? It’s a suspicious-bloke move, it is, selling kale as weed. Are you aware of the averse hallucinogenic effects? Wait, what am I _saying_ , of course you are.”

Remus chuckles, eyes wide as if surprised to be laughing. “Am I aware of the averse hallucinogenic effects of smoking kale?”

“Yes, the effects — the effects only activated on contact with suspicious men.”

“Oh, _those_ , you meant those.”

“Clearly. Kale obviously doesn’t have any other hallucinogenic effects. Everyone knows that.”

The door to the greenhouse slams with vigor. Sirius follows Remus’ gaze so they both watch as Doe Eyes bounds over to them, a coquettish little smile curving her lips. “You missed committee sorting, both of you!”

“Oh, dammit,” Sirius sighs, then glances at Remus to mouth, _“Committee?”_

Remus shakes his head, still with the faded smile on his lips. Unsurprisingly, Doe Eyes sees this — she’s neither blind nor high.

“Each committee has some responsibility to the Garden Hoes for the year. Can I?” She nods at the joint, which Remus doesn’t hesitate to hand to her. “The weeding committee to, well, pull the weeds out in the garden, the painting committee to repaint the shed, the potting committee to pot the plants we buy.” She blows out smoke through pale pink lips. “The only remaining spots are on the cleaning committee, who have to clean out the greenhouse from top to bottom. I guess that’ll be you, Sirius, and…” She looks appraisingly at Remus.

“Remus,” he answers, returns the handshake she offers.

“Dorcas.” She smiles. _Doe Eyes, Dorcas._ It does put less strain on Sirius’ brain to remember that.

“Pleasure.” A silence. Then Remus says, “For the record, I would’ve picked the cleaning committee anyway.”

Sirius leans sideways against the tree, amused. Dorcas asks, “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.” Remus swallows visibly, gives Dorcas an aggressive nod. Sirius watches, lips parted unconsciously, doesn’t look away when Remus locks eyes with him. “I just — love cleaning.”

It’s the last straw. It’s inexorable. Sirius drops to a squat on the ground with an ugly, uncontrollable laugh.


	2. Typeface-fetishist

**SATURDAY - 10:11**

Sirius’ eyes flutter open at a soft tapping on his nose. He’d been at James’ only until one, when he’d grown weary of FIFA and dragged himself home and under the covers. He’s not sure what he’d been expecting, or why exactly he’s shocked to find Gil laying six inches away from him on the bed, close enough that he’s able to use the other end of Sirius’ pillow. He thrashes abruptly, tugging the covers up to his chin with a groan. “Are you serious right now?” he grumbles, squeezing his eyes shut again and kicking at Gil’s gangly legs.

“I’ve never been Sirius, that’s — did you hit your head last night? Having amnesia would make it far too easy for someone to steal your identity.”

Sirius doesn’t move now, eyes closed resolutely. “Please get out of my bed.”

“I mean, I will _gladly_ in just a moment, you smell awful and being here for your morning wank is the last way I’d want to start my Saturday, but I have a rather pressing question for you, Sirius.”

Sirius sighs out his nose. Several seconds elapse before he mutters, “What?”

“Have a look at this.”

Sirius opens his eyes. When his vision slots into focus, his reaction time to realise he’s staring at Gil’s _Grindr_ profile — the primary image a lewd shot of him taken in their disturbingly recognisable bathroom, pink tile and all — is delayed. “What the fuck?” he chokes out, batting the phone away and rolling onto his stomach.

“So it _is_ too much pube.” Gil hums thoughtfully as he retracts his phone. Then it chimes cheerily. “Oh, or perhaps not. _Sterling, 33, 5’8”_ seems fine with it. A bit short, though, don’t you think?” Sirius’ face grows hot with annoyance against the pillow. “But he’s got nice calves, look. And his arse —”

Sirius rises rapidly from his sea of covers, shoving repeatedly at Gil’s side despite his shrieks of protest until he’s gone and tumbled off the edge of Sirius’ bed. His body thuds to the floor, though he rebounds to his feet like he’s made of rubber. “Take the headquarters of fucking Bumfuck Central elsewhere.”

Gil stares down at him, eyes narrowed. His swooping hair is far too massive for this time of morning. Sirius’ eyes dart to his alarm clock — yep, still morning. His fluorescent orange biker shorts are blinding. “That’s a bit rude, Sirius. I’m certain I recall reserving precisely this room as the headquarters. Plus, every other room in the flat is already taken.” At the look Sirius gives him, Gil scoffs, “What? Are you so unimaginative? _Bumfuck_ is not our only department.”

The covers sag off Sirius’ shoulders, leaving him cold. “That can’t be right, because this is _my_ fucking room that I fucking pay the rent for. Get out.”

Gil frowns in contemplation, backing slowly toward the door. “Well _that_ can’t be right, Sirius, as you still owe me last month’s rent.”

Sirius’ fingers curl into the sheets. His eyes fall to the floor. “End of next week, I promise.”

“Mm, I don’t want your promises, keep them.” Gil, at least, closes Sirius’ door behind him. Yet his voice still pierces through the walls. “Shit, Tuney —” Sirius indeed lives with Evans’ sister — “are you baking kale chips again? That bloody _reeks_.”

Sirius picks at a feather poking its pointy end out through his comforter. Kale has him thinking of Remus. But he has an eleven o’clock tutoring appointment twenty minutes away, and if Petunia gets in the shower before him, or worse, if he starts thinking on Remus, he’ll never make it.

**MONDAY 10:43**

Sirius takes a seat three rows back in the Computer Science classroom, near the wall. After years of trial and error, he’s discovered it’s the safest place to be; not far back enough to be constantly checked on for being awake, not central enough to be in the teacher, Mr. Perry’s, direct line of sight. _1.2: Communication and Internet Technologies_ reads the board at the front of the room. _Client- and server-side scripting_. He dumps his bag on the table and, hugging it, lays his cheek to it for a minute-long nap.

He doesn’t even get thirty seconds before the chair beside him scrapes against the floor. Amaline — Evans and Mary’s friend — takes the seat, hardly sparing him a glance. He sits up, observing her in baffled silence.

She’s cracking open the textbook as she says, “You could at least say hello to your fellow Garden Hoe.”

Sirius rubs at his eyes, shrugging out of his jacket. “I didn’t know you were in this class.”

“Mm. I knew you were here, though, because I’ve sat behind you the past week and noticed that no one sits with you. So I thought I’d help a Hoe out.”

Sirius’ brows draw together. “… Thanks?”

“Mhm.” She taps a pen against her lower lip, then finally looks Sirius’ way. “I’ve heard the logic circuit assignment is hard.”

Sirius hums. “And you want my help on it?”

Amaline’s eyes narrow, then she chuckles. “Sure, Sirius.” The room goes black as Mr. Perry flicks off the lights and fires up the projector. They’re forty minutes into the lecture when Sirius clears his throat, leans over so his elbow nudges into Amaline’s arm.

“Speaking of Garden Hoes,” he begins in a whisper.

Amaline turns her head. “If anyone’s speaking of it, it’s you. I only brought it up when I came in.”

Sirius stares for a moment, then rolls his eyes. “Yeah, okay. Is there — did you guys agree upon a next meeting? I missed that last bit on Friday.”

Amaline smiles at him like she knows a secret he doesn’t. “Invested suddenly, are you?”

Sirius blinks quickly. “No, I —”

“You don’t want to pay Lily back or buy her new weed, got it.” Amaline’s eyes flit over his face, then she shakes her head. “Well, no. The committees are meant to branch off and hold their own meetings. I’d advise you have yours soon, ‘cos, well, we can’t do shit in the greenhouse ’til it’s been cleaned. You sat in there, you’ve seen it.”

Sirius looks at the powerpoint at the front of the room. “Yeah, it’s…”

“It’s bad.” Sirius feels Amaline’s impenetrable stare on his profile. “If you and Remus could get started on cleaning this week, that’d be great. Just keep the receipts for any supplies you buy, yeah? We’ll reimburse you.” She tunes back into the lecture, effectively ending the conversation.

Sirius purses his lips, glancing between Amaline and the screen. “ _O_ -kay.”

**MONDAY 14:16**

_“What is the role of co-factors in enzyme activity? Explain with reference to the removal of calcium ions in blood stored for transfusion.”_ Benjy squints at his laptop, propped on his knees. “That’s — I don’t think that’s English.”

James — who sits on the ground for reasons Sirius can’t surmise, other than to perhaps be able to stretch out his legs and appear both nonchalantly lax and also taller than he truly is — pats Benjy on the knee. “I think it’s time we tell him,” he says at Sirius and Peter. “Ben…” He sighs deeply. “It’s English.”

“Yeah, I guess you’d know, wouldn’t you? You read _Pride and Prejudice_ every night before bed.”

James squawks out an incredulous laugh. “ _What_ does that have to do with anything?!”

“So you admit it?”

“Just Google it,” says Sirius. His hand doesn’t fit through the mouth of the olive jar and he hasn’t a fork; either he has to tilt the jar and risk spilling the brine everywhere, or go without the olives at the very bottom.

Ben’s fingers tap across the keyboard. “Oh, shit, there we fuckin’ go!”

Sirius arches an eyebrow and Peter laughs. “I don’t know how you’ve made it this far,” says Peter.

“Hey Sirius.” Dorcas and her blonde friend are smiling down at him from the same spot Mary had stood watch over their bench to invite them to join the Gardening Society last week. Sirius caps his olive jar. She tilts her head to the side. “Sirius’ friends.”

“Whaddup,” says Benjy. Sirius’ smile is reluctant.

“So I was wondering if you were doing anything this Friday night?” asks Dorcas. Her blonde friend nudges her encouragingly. Sirius’ smile fades and he sets his palms on his knees, just to have something to squeeze.

“Er.” He rubs at his knees, then casts a look over his friends. “I think — we have that thing, right? Like, it’s been planned for a few weeks now —”

Peter, James, and Benjy all return his gaze with incredulity, appearing as if they’ve been personally offended by his bumbling words. “Sirius is talking out of his arse,” Benjy puts in, turning to Dorcas. “We’re, like. Totally free. Absolutely, undoubtedly free. All of us.”

Sirius bites at his upper lip and swiftly clears his throat. “I think I might have tutoring.”

“Dude, you never take appointments for Fridays,” mutters Benjy. James snorts and lifts his arm to clamp a hand over Sirius’ mouth, but all he really does is smack him on the nose.

James smiles placidly. “My mate Sirius here is troubled. Why do you ask, love?” Sirius gags a bit at the oily quality to his words and shoves James’ hand away.

Dorcas seems disconcerted, but James’ question brings the easy smile back to her face. “Alice and I were thinking we’d have a little, like, wine night thing at my place, just us and some other year twelves —”

“We’re in,” Benjy practically shouts, on the very edge of the bench, laptop teetering precariously in his lap. “We’re in. And we’ll bring the wine!”

“Oh, perfect.” Dorcas grins and hops a little on the balls of her feet. “Um…” She unlocks her phone and all four of them watch as she stares down at it in concentration. Shortly, Sirius’ screen lights up with the Facebook notification: _Dorcas Meadowes has sent you a friend request_. He smiles tightly. Being the only Sirius at their school, in their city, possibly in the world, makes him pitifully easy to find on social media. “I’ll message you.”

“Bye ladies,” Benjy croons.

“Bye laddies,” Alice laughingly responds, taking Dorcas by the elbow and leading her off.

“What the hell,” Sirius mutters under his breath. The boys all round on him once Dorcas and Alice have made it inside the school. James gets up, takes hold of his face, rattling his head back and forth.

“You almost lost us a _wine night_ , you lunatic,” he breathes. “What is _wrong_ with you?”

Sirius looks into James’ face, alarmed, cheeks squished by his clammy hands. “All we did was snog at Mary’s party, I don’t want to _marry_ her —”

“All you have to do is wine her, you lazy arse.” James releases him, gives him a steadying pat on the head. “And in terms of getting Benjy laid, Alice seemed promising. She didn’t recoil the second he opened his mouth.”

Sirius drops his face to his hands to rub weary circles over his temples.

“And maybe Evans will be there,” James adds.

“You have _no_ reason to believe Evans will be there,” says Peter. “They aren’t even friends.”

“I always hold out hope, mate. Don’t stop believing.”

**TUESDAY 8:25**

Sirius is halfway between the men’s toilet and the tech lab when he rounds the corner to find Remus sitting on the bench in front of the trophy case, hood pulled over his head, eyes on his phone. The ends of his hair still manage to curl out from underneath the hood, as if reaching toward the sunlight like photosynthesising plants.

Sirius deliberately slows his steps in front of him. It works, because Remus lifts his head. Sirius stops short, smiles faintly.

“You’re here early,” says Remus, moving his phone from palm to palm.

Hands on his hips, Sirius nods, clicking his tongue once. “Yeah, I have, er… RobSoc.” When Remus opens his mouth, as if to inquire, Sirius clears his throat and supplies, “Robotics Society meeting.”

“Ah.” Remus leans against the wall and crosses his legs at the ankles. “Very exciting.”

Sirius nods mock-self-importantly. “We’re competing in the spring, so.” He shrugs, looks down the hall. “Technology never sleeps.”

Remus hums. “Unless you put it on sleep mode.”

Sirius bites the tip of his tongue, and his chuckle comes out hoarse from the back of his throat. “Got me there.”

Remus wiggles his eyebrows, lays his head back against the trophy case. Sirius looks him up and down, from the tufts of his hair to his white but mud-caked trainers. “Why are you here so early?”

Half of Remus’ mouth quirks. “Couldn’t sleep.”

Sirius takes a step closer. “So you came to _school_.”

“Where else should I go at seven in the morning?”

Sirius’ eyes go wide. “You’ve been here since seven?”

Remus nods eagerly. “If you get here before the Head Teacher — just check her parking space to make sure — it’s easy enough to break into her office. She’s a nice leather chair, like, the high-backed kind. Lots of interesting papers in her desk. And don’t — _don’t_ even get me started on the email chains. Dra. _Ma_.”

Sirius balks, but then Remus’ face goes from sober to grinning in the blink of an eye. Sirius mutters, “Fuck me,” through a laugh, and Remus looks rather self-satisfied.

He’s about to bid Remus _goodbye_ , tell him _don’t be doing any breaking and entering now_ , when he remembers GardSoc. Sirius claps his hands together. “I — I meant to ask,” he says, stepping closer again. “Amaline said we should have started cleaning the greenhouse, like, yesterday. Pronto. The other committees are having meetings and whatnot, but…” He shakes his head. “Unless you want to discuss sweeping or de-cobwebbing techniques, I say we just go at it.” He winces momentarily. _Poor phrasing_. “For GardSoc.” He shifts his weight, adding offhandedly, “Garden Hoes.”

Remus is unfazed. “Yeah, yeah, let’s.” He holds out his hand, wiggling his fingers in a less-than-sexual come-hither motion. “Give me your phone.”

Sirius does as he’s told. When Remus hands it back, it’s open to his Facebook profile, with _Friend Request Sent_ lit in blue. _Remus Lupin_. He nods, eyes still fixed on his profile picture, then says, “Does… does tomorrow, like, half two work? Or four, if you still have class —”

Remus shakes his head. “Half two’s fine.” He stands, looks from one of Sirius’ eyes to the other, then starts down the hall. “See you.”

Sirius waits to move until he’s out of sight. Back in the lab, he’s teased for taking the world’s longest morning shit.

**TUESDAY 21:07**

Remus’ Facebook page is dreadfully devoid of personal information. One picture — his profile picture, sixteen likes — and his birthdate. Sirius scowls at his laptop screen, nibbles on the wire of his earbuds, and opens a new tab.

 _Remus Lupin_ , he Googles.

His Facebook is the first search result, the second a mention in a roster from what Sirius supposes is his previous school. The third takes him to Youtube.

 _“Edgar Bones, film society correspondent, speaking.”_ The face of a bloke with the thickest eyebrows Sirius has ever laid eyes on fills the screen. Sirius pauses the video, glances toward his closed bedroom door, then unplugs his earbuds from his phone and inserts the jack into his laptop.

 _“It’s me, I’m back, back again for yet another long-awaited Havering film society rundown in the maddening days leading up to the year thirteens’ premiere. Today, we’re talking to my very good mate, the very best of ‘em, Remus Lupin — yeah, there we go, there he is.”_ Edgar turns the camera on Remus, who grins, unknowing of the extreme zoom that restricts the shot to just his eyes, nose, and mouth. _“Jesus fuck, the zoom, sorry.”_ Edgar zooms out. Sirius smiles unconsciously. Remus is wearing the same sweatshirt he’d had on that day.

Remus’ gaze focuses past the camera. _“You fucked up my opening shot?”_ He half-grins.

_“No, no, mate, it’s fine, I’ll cut it out when I edit.”_

_“Yeah, okay.”_

_“Remus Lupin!”_ Edgar shouts again. Sirius turns down the volume, though he has to turn it up again the next time Remus speaks. _“Tell us about your original short film. The world is dying to know.”_

Remus nods, then trains his eyes directly on the camera. _“To the ten viewers of this video, if you’ve made it this far, I won’t hold it against you if you close out now.”_

_“Nobody likes self-deprecation, Remus, you’ve just gone and lost all your viewers.”_

Remus smirks, seems to take a seat. _“My film… It’s a silent film, in black and white. Or, well, ‘silent’ —“ He lifts his fingers in air quotes, “— in that there’s music but no dialogue —”_

Edgar turns the camera on himself. _“He writes original music, this man.”_

 _“Ed.”_ The camera swerves wildly until it finds Remus again, a sweet cross between amused and exasperated. _“The film, it… tracks the confrontations and interactions of its two protagonists. They recognise during their very first meeting that they have a connection that goes beyond the typical. They say nothing of it, of course… they say nothing at all the entire film. But the audience… the audience is omniscient. The audience reads the protagonists’ thoughts on the screen, like captions for the unsaid. Text in colour. They know throughout what the protagonists feel and what they want to say and do. What they think of themselves and those around them. One of the protagonists is overly concerned with what others think of them, the other has… something of a monster inside them.”_

_“And why don’t they speak, Remus?”_

_“They’re too scared, at first.”_ Remus tents his fingers. _“But as they come to a realisation, this soul-binding realisation that only Brontë’s been able to put into words —_ ‘He’s more myself than I am,’ _as said by, er, Cathy in_ Wuthering Heights _— they don’t need to speak. The more they interact, the more they gain the omniscient privilege of the audience… until they’re practically telepathic. One knows what the other feels just through touch, sight. Taste.”_ Remus’ lips quirk. _“For one another only. As if they’re reading each other’s captions.”_

Edgar whistles lowly. _“That’s bloody romantic, mate.”_

Remus scoffs. _“That is the goal.”_

_“And you play one of the protagonists in — what’s the film’s title?”_

“Synchronicity,” states Remus. Edgar laughs but Remus only raises his brows. _“And yes.”_

_“And the other?”_

_“My partner.” Partner._ Remus leans closer to the camera, smile growing sneaky. _“Out of convenience. She’s no actress.” She._

_“We’re almost at the five minute mark, and we know Edgar Bones, film society correspondent, does not like being cut off on school telly. Quick, Remus — who’s your inspiration? What’s your inspiration? Three words.”_

Remus tilts his head back with a laugh. _“Er —_ ”

_“That’s one word!”_

_“It’s not a fucking word! Fuck, er — you’ll bleep these out, yeah? Er… Wes Anderson. Myself. That’s three words.”_

_“Thank you, Remus Lupin. That’s all we have time for, folks. Bones out.”_ Edgar swivels himself around to get in the shot. The video ends on him headbutting into Remus’ shoulder whilst holding up a peace sign.

Sirius shuts his laptop, lays facedown in the sheets for a moment. Then he opens it again, white light flooding his vision, and searches _Wes Anderson_.

**WEDNESDAY 14:59**

Before school, Sirius had gone to deposit his tutoring cheques and then to pick up a load of cleaning supplies without checking his bank balance, cautiously optimistic he would have enough left over to pay Gil back for the rent.

Now he’s been sat on a stool in the very middle of the expansive, dingy floor of the greenhouse for over twenty minutes. He kicks at the plastic Tesco bag, knocking over a bottle of multi-surface spray, unrolling and rerolling the receipt between jittery fingers. When he checks his phone for the eighth time and the _15:00_ on the lockscreen seems to scream at him, he opens Facebook Messenger, a conversation with Remus Lupin. **_Hey where r u?_ ** Deletes it. **_Hey, I’m at the greenhouse! Where are you?_ ** Deletes it. **_Just got to the greenhouse_ ** — Deletes it, too. “Fuck,” he mutters, pocketing his phone and swiping his bag from the floor and leaving behind the greenhouse, empty of anything but gathered dirt and mildew and dead insects and disappointment and anyone but Sirius.

**FRIDAY 10:32**

“It’s the weirdest thing,” breathes Benjy as he, Sirius, and James traverse the schoolyard. “I’ve been, you know, trying to hype myself up for this _rendez-vous_ with Alice tonight, but… all I can think about is Greenhouse Mary.”

 _“Greenhouse Mary?”_ Sirius echoes, thumbs hooked between his chest and the straps of his bag. “We’ve known Mary since middle school. You can just say _Mary_.”

“You’re not wrong, but I never really… never _saw_ her until now. Until the greenhouse.”

“Fuck the greenhouse.” James narrowly dodges ramming into a tree as his eyes are fixed on his phone. He’s done it before and shattered his glasses in the process. “It’s only ‘cos she didn’t have tits in middle school.”

“Mm. Could be.”

“Why is it only ever about tits with you both?” Sirius mutters.

“Yeah, Ben, what about intelligence and strength of character?” James parries through a broad grin.

Benjy chokes mid-laugh. “Feel free to drop the act anytime now, Jamie, Evans isn’t listening in.”

“Shut up.” James then elbows Sirius in the side. “It’s your turn to get the booze for tonight, mate.”

“ _Wine_ ,” Benjy interjects. “Only wine. Because we’re classy men catering to classy ladies.”

Sirius gives Benjy a blatant once-over. “Next time you claim to possess a modicum of class, check for spunk stains on your jeans.”

“What?!” Benjy hisses, pulling back the hem of his shirt to examine the crusty stain by his zip. “Oh, that’s only yogurt. Or… maybe not, I can’t remember the last time I had yogurt.”

Sirius nods gravely, eyebrow raised. “I stand by what I said.”

Benjy lifts his eyes, defeated yet amused. He claps a hand onto Sirius’ shoulder. “I can always rely on you for harsh judgment.”

Sirius smirks. “It’s in my blood.” He thumps Benjy on the back. “Do your laundry, Benjamin. If you, by some miracle, manage to get Alice on her knees and it _stinks_ down there —”

“Stare at Ben’s crotch a little less, would you?” James jumps in. At the receiving end of Sirius’ eye-roll, James shrugs innocently. “Unless you’re into that.”

Sirius’ lip curls but he resolves to not get overly defensive. Instead, he angles his body into James as they walk, brushes his nose along James’ cheekbone. “Jealous it’s not your crotch?” he whispers.

James half-laughs, half-chokes out something like _gay fucker_ and shoves Sirius into Benjy, who catches him underneath the arms as in a trust fall.

They make their way into the school like that, Sirius’ feet dragging along the ground as Benjy hauls him along, James of no help. Benjy urges Sirius onto his feet when they must branch apart at the door of the tech lab, Benjy heading to Biology and James to History. Sirius has a free period; he slips through the door into the empty lab, tossing his bag and coat onto a chair and firing up a computer. With all the fracas of passersby in the hallway, he thinks nothing of the sound of the lab door closing, fixated on the log-in screen, until a head pops up from behind his monitor and Sirius startles to the point of upsetting the balance of his rolling chair. He doesn’t fall.

“You scared the shit out of me,” he breathes, taking in the sight of Remus on the other side of the table, leaned into his palms. He wheels around in the chair, scans the lab once more. Still empty. “What are you doing in here?” His gaze settles on Remus again, who’s yet to halt half-smiling in that way of his.

“I followed you.” Remus seats himself, drums fingers against the tabletop, eyes the partitioned-off area in the back of the room behind glass. “Do I need special privileges to be in here?”

Sirius smiles faintly over the top of the monitor, then focuses on the screen again. “You’re new, so you wouldn’t know, but typically one submits an entry permit application to _me_ three months in advance of their anticipated visit. This, of course, includes a non-refundable application fee of a hundred quid. Cash only. But I do accept bribes in drug form.”

Remus says nothing. Sirius opens a browser, then looks at Remus calmly over the computer. He barely counts to three before Remus caves in and laughs, rough yet soft. “Damn. See you in three months, then.”

Sirius fails at keeping his smile to himself, but says nothing more until Remus clears his throat and murmurs, “I’m sorry about Wednesday. Something came up. I should’ve texted.”

Sirius shakes his head minutely. “No worries, mate.”

Remus follows surprisingly quickly with, “Are you free today for a bit? After your classes?”

Sirius accidentally closes a tab instead of selecting it. His eyes flicker to Remus. “To clean the greenhouse?”

Remus nods, swiveling to and fro on his chair.

Sirius had received a text from Dorcas the night before, inviting him and the lads over for eight that night. His class ends at four. “For a bit, yeah.”

Remus hums. “Good.” He gets up, proceeds to pace the classroom. Concentration is futile while he does so. Sirius leans back in his chair and watches him.

Remus points at the glass-sequestered corner. “What’s that in there?”

It’s a robotic arm, plain to see. Sirius still indulges him, lacing his fingers over his stomach. “ISAC.”

Remus looks over his shoulder. “It has a name?”

Sirius bats his eyelashes and affects the most snobbish tone he can manage. Mimicking his mother has always been one of Sirius’ strong suits. “Dost thou perceivest me as the kind of man who doesn’t name his children?”

Remus’ lower lip goes pale under the pressure of his teeth, but he’s half-smiling again. “Forgive me. I didn’t know you were a father.”

Sirius is on his feet before he realises it, traipsing past Remus toward the glass room. “His name is pretty unsentimental, actually.” He digs out his keychain from the tight depths of his jeans pocket, rifles to the right one, and unlocks the door to the windowed room. “For his _Identity-Specific reACtions_. I, S, AC.” He whirls around to face Remus as he nudges open the door.

Remus follows, eyes not leaving Sirius’ face. “Layman’s terms, please?”

Sirius chuckles and lets the door glide shut behind him. “It’s called self-supervised machine learning.” He leans backward into the door while Remus skirts the table upon which ISAC sits. “There’s a tiny camera in his arm… Basically what he does is take pictures at all different angles of whatever object you set in front of him. Then he makes sense of it in 3D and uses an algorithm to identify specific features of the object and decide how to correctly interact with them. Like… picking up a mug by its handle, say.”

Remus hums, skates his fingers along the table’s edge. “Show me?”

 _I thought you’d never ask_. Sirius chuckles, turns on the computer containing ISAC’s user interface, then bounds impulsively over to the windows overlooking the courtyard. He unlatches the window and shoves it open, and Remus must think him mad as he hangs halfway out the window, scanning the slowly wilting gerberas planted along the wall, and snaps one in half at its stem. With the flower between his teeth, he shuts the window and turns to Remus, who regards him with an unreadable expression. “Don’t fail me now, mate,” he whispers to ISAC as he sets the gerbera on the marked _X_ on the table and then slides over to the computer, tapping and clicking with a flourish and whirling to stare at ISAC, hands on his hips.

Remus looks between Sirius and the robot as the latter whirs to life. The arm shifts mechanically to capture the promised images, and after the sixth, it seems to stop to think. Then it hums, lowers its claw to hover by the table’s surface, pinches the flower by its stem, and lifts it toward Remus, who’s stood directly opposite. Sirius feels the excited grin overcome him and he hoots, claps his hands victoriously, only for the flower to slip from ISAC’s grasp. Remus catches it, eyes alight, holds it to his nose to smell despite its browning petals.

“It’s, er.” Sirius scratches at the back of his neck, feeling flushed from head to toe from the active thrumming of his heart, sending blood rushing up to his dizzy head and down to tingling toes. “Smaller of a target than he’s used to. The friction —”

“It was brilliant.”

Sirius’ voice dies in his throat. Still, he thinks he manages a smile. Remus comes toward him, flower dangling between his fingers. He tucks it into the chest pocket of Sirius’ shirt. “You’re a bit brilliant, aren’t you?”

Sirius’ lips part, and for a moment nothing comes out until he feels his brain start to buzz with confused, latent activity, like ISAC turning on after days of hibernation. “So I’ve been told,” he says, eyebrows rising.

Remus huffs out a laugh through his nose, eyes crinkled at the corners, but then his phone vibrates. He gives it a passing glance, then opens the door. “Greenhouse at four?”

Sirius nods jerkily. It’s not suave at all. He leans into the desk behind him to regain his air of nonchalance. _Did I have any to begin with?_ “Greenhouse at four.”

“Okay.” Remus leaves him with ISAC.

Sirius waits until the outer door closes behind Remus to turn to ISAC’s computer to power it down and mutter, “You choose _now_ to fail me?”

**FRIDAY 16:07**

From a distance, Sirius can see the vague shape of Remus moving about inside the greenhouse through the dirt-smudged windows. He’s easy to spot, whether alone or in a crowd, Sirius has decided. Tall, lanky, standing with a slight stoop to his shoulders, hair fluffy and untamed.

Sirius pulls out his earbuds. Too much reflection.

Remus holds an old broom aloft his head, swatting with its bristles at the cobwebbed corners where the walls meet the ceiling. He looks over when Sirius enters, waving cheerily. Sirius nods at him, proceeds to unbutton his outer layer. The daisy from his pocket had fallen out sometime between his last two periods, likely now squashed under the heel of someone’s shoe.

Remus comes over to where Sirius stands by the bags, brandishing in one hand the old broom and in the other, the tool window washers always use on TV. “For you.” He presses the window-washer into Sirius’ hands just barely after Sirius is able to toss his shirt onto the floor. Remus’ hands are gloved in pink rubber. He notices Sirius staring and wiggles his digits. “Oh, sorry, did you want to wear these?” He frowns at his palms.

Sirius’ eyes narrow. “Those are the gloves _I_ bought on Wednesday. For when you didn’t show.”

“Are they?” Remus doesn’t take them off. He leans instead into the broom, thoughtful. Then he pulls a yellow pair from his back pocket. “Good thing the pack came with two.”

Sirius snorts, swipes them from his grasp, balancing the window-washer against the inside of his elbow as he tugs them on. “Where the fuck did you find this?” He nods at the tool.

“It’s called a squeegee.” Remus makes his way toward another cobwebbed corner. “I found it in the last place anyone might think to look for cleaning supplies, Sirius.” He hoists the broom above his head again. “The janitor’s closet.”

“You nicked this from the janitor?”

“Chill, they won’t miss it. They wash the windows on Mondays.” The smile Remus shoots him over his shoulder is conspiratorial.

Sirius gives a slow shake of his head. They fall into silence as Remus sweeps the floor and Sirius splashes washing liquid across the windows, _squeegee_ ing them with vigour. Remus has to shed his jumper after some time, too, left in a white t-shirt identical to Sirius’ own. Sirius is in a trance, eyes swimming only with the sensation of sparkling blue dripping down the hazy window, when the door to the greenhouse slams. He jerks away from the wall, squeegee in hand, to find himself alone. The first thing he thinks is _I wouldn’t think Remus the type to just up and leave_ , but he hardly knows Remus at all, and he already knows he’s the type to not show without warning.

Sirius startles at a knock on the greenhouse wall. Through the grimy glass, Remus waves at him, with a twin squeegee in hand. He bites his lip in concentration as he wipes down the outside, after which Sirius, staring and unmoving, can see him with crystal clearness. Remus leans closer to the window, knocks again but softer this time, and mouths what Sirius thinks is _get back to work_.

Sirius does. There are moments he catches himself with aching arms because he’s lifted the bucket of water with the intent of rinsing the windows and held it for god knows how long without following through, instead having zeroed in on the boy on the wall’s other side, arms rippling as he squeegees with enthusiasm. It’s easy enough to shake himself out of it, but several times he considers upending the water bucket over his head.

When Remus strolls back into the greenhouse, an hour has passed and Sirius’ arms are sore but the windows are as clean as they’ll get — everywhere but the roof, naturally.

“I’d say the cleaning committee deserves a gold star for efficiency,” says Remus, dropping the squeegee to the floor with a clatter.

Sirius, sitting cross-legged on the floor, nods with urgency. “If Mary doesn’t ceremonially pin a ribbon to my chest and — and bestow upon me an achievement certificate signed by Barack Obama, I’m gonna have to publicly and dramatically quit the Garden Hoes.”

Remus levels him with a look. “Barack Obama.”

“No less.”

“I see.”

Sirius snickers, tilts his head back against the wall, then sighs wearily.

Remus holds up a finger. “Ah, ah. Not so fast. We’re far from finished.”

Sirius sits up, blinks at him. It should seem concerning, both to him and perhaps Remus, too, that Sirius can’t help but look at him smilingly whenever he does. “What the _fuck_ could we possibly —”

“We’re not leaving until the floor is clean enough to eat off of.” Sirius isn’t sure how he didn’t notice it before. Remus wheels a contraption he’s plugged into the wall into the center of the space. Sirius looks at it skeptically. “We should be grateful the janitors had a pressure washer.”

Sirius scoffs, clambers onto his feet. “Give me one instance in which anyone, _anyone_ would ever willingly eat off the floor of a greenhouse, clean or not.”

“I’ll be the first once we’ve finished with this.” Remus looks at him expectantly. “Or you.”

Sirius slides his hands into his pockets, shaking his head. “I won’t.”

“You’ll be drooling for it, Sirius, once we get this floor sparkling.” Remus eyes the pressure washer. “But first… for maximum efficiency.” Remus goes to his bag, roots around inside of it until he produces a cylindrical portable speaker. “I don’t know why we didn’t put anything on sooner. Music makes everything sail smoother.”

“Oh yeah?” Sirius meanders toward him. Remus merely stares down at his phone. “And what’s your productivity song of choice?”

Remus’ eyes sparkle with mischief as he sets his phone down. Then he holds a finger to his lips, as if to will Sirius into silence as soft drumming and strings emanate from the speaker.

“No,” whispers Sirius, and Remus laughs. “ _Remus_ —”

 _“He said, ‘Let’s get out of this town, drive out of the city, away from the crowds.’”_ Remus takes Sirius’ hands, forces him to twirl about in place, but Sirius’ arms are so stiff their limbs only get tangled. “You’re terrible at this,” Remus chides, releasing Sirius and taking him by the shoulders instead. _“He’s so_ tall _and handsome as_ hell _, he’s so_ bad _but he does it so well…”_

Remus is looking directly into his eyes as he lip-syncs the words with goofy theatricality and Sirius’ heart is rocketing and still the only thing Sirius’ mouth can do is complain that Remus is playing fucking _Taylor Swift_. “Why am I getting this _sinking_ feeling you know every word?”

“Of course I know every word.” Remus pushes Sirius away playfully, spins and flails about in the center of the greenhouse.

Sirius stumbles backward. His smile splits his face in half. “You know we’ve just cleaned these windows? _Anyone_ can see in.”

“Let them. _Anyone_ would understand. Anyone but you, it seems.” Remus freezes so he can belt out, _“Wiiiiiildest dreams, aah-hah!”_ at the top of his lungs.

“Fucking hell,” Sirius wheezes. Remus laughs loud over the music, bending to put his hands on his knees. When Sirius inadvertently echoes his laughter, the next two minutes of the song find them both cackling, unable to move off the dusty greenhouse floor. Sirius begins to crawl toward the speaker. “Turn this shit off, it’s like a — like some cursed siren song —”

“Don’t you dare.” Remus stumbles over just in time for the slow chorus, smacking Sirius’ hand away.

“Ow!” Sirius yelps, but then Remus takes him by the cheeks, fingers gentle but still squeezing as if Sirius’ is the face of a child.

 _“Red lips and rosy cheeks,”_ Remus teases to the tune of the song, pinching respectively at Sirius’ lower lip and the apples of his cheeks. Sirius can’t be too angry considering his cheeks must thereafter be all but rosy. The song fades out and Remus just looks at him, gasping in genuine concern and touching Sirius’ cheek again. “Oh god, did that hurt?”

“No. Get off.” Sirius shoves at his shoulder and sits up, eyes moving to the speaker. “What’s next? _You’re on the phone with your girlfriend, she’s upset_ —”

Remus chuckles. “If you’d like.” But when the next song plays, it’s not Taylor Swift. Sirius flings his arm out to grab Remus’ phone, reading _Happy When It Rains_ off the screen. “Mm, what’s this?”

Remus snatches the phone from his grasp and stands up. “Clearly it’s not mine. I only listen to Taylor.”

Sirius peers up at him from the floor. “Right,” he mutters, unconvinced and smirking.

“It doesn’t matter what we play when we wash the floor, anyway. The pressure washer’s rather loud.”

Sirius helps Remus move their shit outside to safety. Pressure washing the greenhouse only means spraying mucky water on one another, trading off who wields the power of the hose. After Remus catches Sirius on the shin and he hollers in pain — subsequently laughing it off when Remus offers him an opportunity for revenge — they’re careful not to hose one another down. Sirius’ phone says _18:20_ by the time they get out of the greenhouse, both in uncomfortably damp clothes with dust in their hair and on their faces. They share expressions of commiseration as Remus tugs on his jumper and Sirius his button-down over their dirtied shirts.

Schlepping toward the bus stop with Remus in silence, Sirius thumbs through his notifications.

**_Dorcas: you’re all coming at 8, right??_ **

**_Dorcas: excited to see you! xx_ **

Sirius grimaces outwardly.

**_Benjy: sirius fucking black_ **

**_Benjy: don’t forget the wine_ **

**_Benjy: clink clink motherfuckers_ **

**_James: whats dorcas address_ **

Sirius locks his phone and stuffs it into his pocket. When he looks Remus’ way, he gets the half-smile.

“Everything okay?”

Sirius tongues the inside of his cheek, then looks ahead. “You’re eighteen, right?”

Remus’ chuckle is soft. “Nineteen.”

Sirius nods, teeth dragging over his lower lip, before he turns toward Remus with readily pleading hands glued together from the heel to the tip of his middle finger. “Could you do me the biggest favor, mate? Like, there’s this party I have to go to, and —”

Remus holds a hand to his chest. “You want me to…” He drops his head closer to Sirius’ and casts about a surreptitious glance. “Buy… you… _alcohol?”_

Sirius’ expression goes blank and he rolls his eyes away. He steps under the shelter of the bus stop and takes a seat, rubbing his fingertips into his eyes. It’s a moronic idea, as his fingers are filthy and his eyes immediately start to itch. “Never mind.”

Remus drops down beside him. “Is wine okay?” Sirius lowers his hands. Remus’ smile is warm, even if he’s now gazing into the street. “I have quite the stockage at home, if you want.”

Sirius laces his fingers together, elbows on his knees. “Remus Lupin, enthusiast of wine and Taylor Swift.”

“Shh.” Remus laughs, nudges Sirius’ shoulder with his own.

Sirius raises his voice. “Remus Lupin has all of Taylor Swift’s discography memorised!”

“I’ll kill you,” Remus says evenly, chin propped up in his hand as he stares Sirius down. “Anyhow, that’s a lie. I can only recite _Wildest Dreams_ and _Getaway Car_ from memory. They’re arguably her best songs.”

Sirius gapes at him. “You know, at first you were lesser in my eyes for knowing all of _Wildest Dreams_ , but now you’re lesser in my eyes for knowing only _Wildest Dreams_ ,” he says with matter-of-factness. 

“Hard to please, aren’t you?”

Sirius watches Remus, feeling his lips tug upward at the corners. Then Remus stands. The bus is there, _when did the bus get here?_

“Are you coming?”

**FRIDAY 18:51**

Remus invites him up to his fourth-floor flat. The entryway is so cramped that after Sirius gets inside, he has to plaster himself against the wall so Remus can get the door shut. Remus unnecessarily apologises for it, then says, “Come in, come in,” leaving his shoes neatly by the door and heading down the hallway. He disappears through a door on the left, leaving Sirius to look at the myriad of unframed prints tacked into the wall.

Sirius hasn’t moved much by the time Remus returns, is stood examining a print of Klimt’s _The Kiss_.

“I said come in,” says Remus, holding two wine bottles in one hand and one in the other, two red and one white. “Is three enough?” He glances at their labels absently. “I have more.”

Sirius chuckles and shrugs his backpack onto the floor. “As long as I bring anything, the guys aren’t allowed to complain, so.” He shakes his head. “Three’s fine.”

“Okay.” Remus still holds the bottles, propping their butts against his hips. “Er… are you in a hurry? Do you want to stay for a glass? I have beer, too. But I…” He looks down at himself, then at Sirius. Both their dark jeans are littered with muddy spots. “I could use a quick shower, if you don’t mind waiting.” Remus half-smiles. Always. “You could hop in after.”

Sirius leans into the wall. “Are you calling me dirty?”

Remus feigns thinking, then nods.

Sirius cracks a smile. “Fair enough.”

“You have time?”

“Plenty.”

Remus passes the wine to Sirius. All of it. He struggles to balance with it in his arms. “Bedroom-slash-living-room’s through there, make yourself at home. Beer’s in the fridge.” Then Remus shuts himself behind the door at the end of the hall. 

He sets the wine on Remus’ coffee table. The room has a small fireplace, a loveseat crammed in, a turntable taking up all the real estate on a nightstand, a big, curtained-off mattress. On the wall above the loveseat is something like a collage of nonsensical text, snippets from magazines cut out and pinned and pasted together like a quilt of a word longer than that one in _Mary Poppins_. He slumps onto the sofa, eyes wandering the film posters on the other walls. _Pierrot le Fou_. _Moonrise Kingdom_ , which came up in Sirius’ Wes Anderson search. _The Dreamers_.

It’s not even ten minutes before Remus comes out. By then Sirius has lost himself in his Instagram feed, and is unreasonably shocked when he looks up to find Remus, hair flatter than he’s ever seen it, with only a towel around his waist. “Shower’s all yours. You can use the towel I put out on the sink. I’ll leave some clothes outside the door for you.”

“Thanks,” Sirius says, then leaps up when it seems like Remus is seconds away from dropping his towel.

The last thing Sirius wants to do is _indulge_ , not when Remus is out there and waiting for him, so he washes hastily with the bar soap and gives his hair a cursory rinse. He towels off with the fluffy, white towel Remus left for him, eyeballs the hair products and other toiletries on the sink, then looks down at his dirty jeans, considering putting them back on despite Remus’ hospitality. But then when he cracks the bathroom door and peeks at the offering on the floor, he sees it’s a pair of soft joggers and a patterned jumper similar but different to the one Remus had worn that day. He chooses them.

There’s two opened beers on the coffee table when Sirius comes again into Remus’ room. Remus is on the sofa, ankle across his knee, his hair recovering its volume the longer it dries. He’s attempting to spark a joint between his lips with a lighter verging on dead. Sirius grabs the one from his own bag, kneels on the sofa to light it for him. Remus doesn’t take his eyes off him as he inhales, then leans over, smoke trailing from his lips, to pick up the beers. He clinks them together himself before handing Sirius his own. “Feel better?” he asks, eyeing the damp spots on the jumper he’s got on, left by Sirius’ hair where it hasn’t quite dried.

Sirius takes a pull from the beer. “Loads.” Remus passes him the joint. Once he’s taken a drag, sighed, let his cheek drop to the sofa cushion, he nods up at the wall. The wall of letters. “What’s that?”

Remus doesn’t look to check what Sirius means, just smiles at him, the mouth of the beer bottle resting against his lower lip. “You don’t like my wall of letters?”

“I never said that. _Why_ do you have a wall of letters?”

“I like letters.”

“You _like letters_.”

“Why is that so bizarre? Someone has to.”

“Mm. The planet would derail its orbit if you quit your letter appreciation.”

“Not quite.” Remus takes back the joint, puffs on it heavily, then hands it again to Sirius. “But typography is important. Not as important as, say, robotic arms, but.” He rises, wandering toward the turntable.

“Like how?” Sirius rests his beer between his legs. When he sees Remus start to leaf through records on his bookshelf, he clears his throat and sits up. “Don’t tell me you have Taylor Swift on vinyl.”

Remus chuckles, shakes his head. “Then I won’t tell you.” Sirius stares at the back of his neck.

“Can you play the band that came on after _Wildest Dreams_?” He reclines again. “In the greenhouse?”

Remus hums in thought. Sirius smiles around the joint, watching him search. He’s got a fresh patterned jumper on. He’s not sure if Remus and himself, now also in one of Remus’ jumpers, match or clash. Likely the latter. “I do have _Darklands_.” Remus slides the record from the sleeve, sets it on the turntable. Presses play and moves the tone arm. Remus swivels on his socked heel to face him, head tilted to the side. “Happy?”

It’s a song that Sirius doesn’t recognise, but he nods nonetheless.

“Good.” Remus joins him on the sofa. “How is typography important?”

Sirius forgot he’d asked such a question, but he’d like the answer to it, he decides. “Mhm.”

“Well, it’s readability and accessibility that are important. Aesthetics are secondary, but that’s the fun part.” Remus picks up Sirius’ phone from the coffee table, lifts it up to his face to show him the texts littering his lockscreen. “How would you like it if all your messages were in a cursive font?” He quirks a brow. “Or Comic Sans?”

Sirius frowns, takes his phone. “What’s wrong with Comic Sans?” His lockscreen screams:

**_James: mate the address_ **

**_James: RESPOOOOOOOND_ **

**_Peter: Leave Sirius alone, Friday afternoons are for masturbation_ **

**_James: wtf pete_ **

**_Peter: Yeah okay nvm Sirius send the address when you can we’ll meet you there_ **

**_Benjy: yeah wtf pete… you only wank once a week ?_ **

**_Dorcas: you said you’re bringing wine yeah? xx_ **

When he looks up from his phone, Remus’ gaze is critical. Sirius kicks his ankle gently. “Come off it, I was kidding. Comic Sans is rubbish.” He offers the joint. Their fingers brush as Remus takes it.

“I was ready to throw you out.” Remus rises to get himself a second beer and drops the joint into the ashtray.

**_[To: Group] Sirius: she hasn’t sent me anything yet, maybe it’s not happening_ **

**_[To: Dorcas] Sirius: Sorry, getting mixed vibes from everyone rn about going out. trying to get them on board x_ **

Remus sets two more beers on the table. Upon seeing this, Sirius goes immediately to drink his own faster, only halfway gone, and Remus laughs, settling beside him again.

Sirius clears his throat to ask, “What’s your favorite typeface?” in the yellow glow of Remus lighting the joint again with Sirius’ lighter.

Around it, Remus asks, “Serif or sans-serif?”

Sirius scoffs. “Snob.”

Remus smiles even as he blows the smoke out the corner of his mouth. Sirius’ eyes zero in on it. “It’s a broad fucking question. _Didot_ is quite nice. And _Gotham_. But lettering artists will never stop making new ones, like… one of my favorite uses of a typeface in _film_ is the title screen for this one by Wes Anderson.”

Sirius’ eyes flit to the poster on the wall opposite. “That one?”

Remus doesn’t look toward the poster, but slumps lower on the sofa. “Mhm. Have you seen it?”

“No.”

“It’s a charming little film.”

Sirius lifts his eyebrows, chuckles quietly. “Oh?”

Remus nods sagely. This time, when he proffers the joint, he does it beside Sirius’ mouth. When Sirius moves his hand to take it, Remus draws the joint away. “None of that.”

Sirius looks at him, blinking and laughing breathlessly, “Oh, I see, you’re not letting me use my hands?”

“No hands.” Remus’ eyes say _where would be the fun in that?_

 _Hands can be fun,_ Sirius thinks. “Yeah, okay,” he whispers, eyes scanning Remus’ face, running the tip of his tongue over grinning teeth. Then he leans forward to pinch the butt of the joint between his lips. Remus lets go, and Sirius leans back, taking an inhale. When he considers it safe to handle the joint, he plucks it from between his lips. “Well, what does Dee-doe look like, then?”

**FRIDAY 20:32**

Twenty minutes before, Remus had put on a record by a musician of the name Laurie Anderson, of which Sirius had smirkingly said, “This is weird as fuck,” to which Remus had responded with a _Deal With It_ -kind of shrug.

They’re both on the shaggy rug in front of the coffee table, Sirius on his knees, Remus cross-legged and bent ardently over a piece of lined sketchbook paper, fine-tipped marker in hand. “You ruined my _B_ ,” mutters Remus.

“It was a very standard _B_. Nothing we haven’t seen before. _Begging_ for embellishment. What would the typography gods have said about it? The lovechild of _Georgia_ and _Times New Roman_? How _groundbreaking_.”

Remus shoots him a look. Sirius laughs so hard mid-gulp that beer dribbles from the corner of his mouth. “Well, now it looks nothing like a letter B,” Remus says.

“Who said it had to?”

“You’re very illogical for an engineer.”

“And you’re close-minded for a… _typist_.”

“A typist types for a living, Sirius.”

“A typeface-fetishist.”

Remus bites back a smile.

“A multifaceted creative.” Sirius thinks a moment. “… Fetishist.”

“Shut up,” Remus laughs. “Anyhow, the letter B must look like a letter B for anyone to be able to make sense of words written in this typeface.” He gives up trying to fix the _B_ , dropping the marker to the table. “In case you were confused about that part. The whole… reading thing.”

Sirius just watches him a beat too long. “Yeah, thanks for clearing that up.” He twirls his empty bottle on the tabletop, then sighs. “Anyone trying to read this is fucked.”

“The other letters are fine,” Remus protests. The way ‘Remus protests’ is unlike the way any of Sirius’ friends do; James and Benjy are shrill and indignant, Peter is whiney and insecure. Remus’ protests are monotonous and direct, as if what he says is the hard and only truth.

“Mm.” Sirius lifts his empty bottle. “Can you get me another?”

“Kitchen’s right across the hall.”

Sirius has to suppress his smile as he wheedles, “But I don’t… I would _hate_ to, like, muck anything up in there, or —”

Remus rises, flipping him the bird with both hands.

“Ah, wow, you’re really good at that!” Sirius remarks brightly, gesturing vaguely at Remus’ hands, and the moment he’s out the door Sirius scrambles for the marker and the sheet of paper.

“What did you do,” says Remus no less than forty-five seconds later.

Sirius lays down the marker.

“It’s indecipherable,” Remus murmurs, squatting on the opposite side of the coffee table and resting his chin atop the beer in his hand. Sirius smiles, sly, until Remus shoves the beer at him and snatches the paper for himself. Sirius lifts the bottle to take a swig, eyes tracking the marker as Remus labels each symbol with its original, corresponding letter. Then he caps the marker and lays it down, appearing overall contented. “Now it’s a secret language.”

Sirius glances slowly between him and the paper.

Remus blinks challengingly. “What’s that look for?”

Sirius sighs, anticipating it, the waffling-on he’s about to do, and it’s only his third beer. “It’s… what you did there… substitution ciphers are the _weakest_ encryption scheme.”

Remus sets his chin upon his fist. “Oh, _do_ tell.”

“Fuck off.” Sirius snorts. “It’s just the simplest you can manage. Should someone intercept our communications under that scheme, it wouldn’t be hard at all for them to figure out which symbol stands for which character. Regularities of the English language make it susceptible to frequency analysis…” He realises his gaze has roamed the room, across Remus’ film posters and to the window, and then he looks toward Remus, whose eyes are a bit glassy and his cheeks a bit pink, lips in his crooked smile.

Remus raises his brows. “No, do go on.”

Sirius scoffs. “You’re _mocking_ me, are you —?”

“Why does it sound as if you’d readily make it possible for the enemy to steal our secret messages?”

Sirius’ jaw drops and he slams his hand down on the table. “I wouldn’t! I would never! But there’s always a chance, Remus, we ought to prepare for the worst.”

Remus shrugs. “Then we’ll put extra tape on our messages.” 

“Tape?”

“Tape the papers shut for secure transport. Or use several envelopes, and then burn them after reading them.”

Sirius just takes him in, ugly jumper and flushed cheeks and all.

At the silence, Remus says, “Listen, Sirius, if you don’t want to exchange secret messages with me, just say it.”

It hurts to smile so wide. “About that, er, you won’t be hurt?”

Remus is quite good at maintaining poker faces. “Of course I’ll be fucking hurt.” But then he grins and Sirius swears some nonexistent sunlight — the sun sank into the horizon long ago — glints in his eyes. Then the doorbell rings and Remus’ eyes dart to the living room doorway. “Fuck,” he whispers. “What time’s it?”

Sirius checks. “Quarter to nine.”

“Shit.” Remus is on his feet, gathering the beer bottles by their necks, then throwing open the window. “I don’t — sorry, I don’t mean to throw you out. I forgot my girlfriend was coming over.” He fruitlessly wafts at the window with the bottles clenched in his fingers, smile sheepish. “She doesn’t like it when I smoke.”

Sirius shakes his head, gets up. His mouth tastes bitter all the sudden. “I should go anyway… the party.”

“Right.” Remus strides past him into the kitchen. The doorbell rings, thrice this time.

“Should I let her in?” Sirius calls after Remus.

“What?” A clinking of bottles. Sirius waits a beat, then goes for the door anyway.

A smartly-dressed girl with cropped, blonde curls stands on Remus’ doormat. She looks him over, likely recognising the clothes on his back. “Hi?” she says tentatively. “Is Remus…”

“I’m here.” Remus touches the small of Sirius’ back when he appears beside him. “Just come in, babe, er — this is Sirius. Sirius, Ros, my partner.”

Her face is a bit warmer when she regards Sirius this time. “Good to meet you,” she says, and the three of them all hold their breaths as Ros squeezes by in the cramped foyer. “Did you forget about dinner? I’m starved and all I smell is skunk.”

“Working on it,” Remus mutters. Sirius puts on his shoes, stuffs his dirty clothes into his bag, slings it over his shoulder. He’s almost out the door when Remus’ hand clamps over his shoulder and he holds up a finger. He jogs off into the living room, edging past Ros, and comes back with the three wine bottles. “Won’t be much of a party without these.” He smiles, not letting go until Sirius has a handle on everything.

“Yeah, thanks,” says Sirius, finding himself unable to even force a smile back. He’s never been very good at pretending.

“I’ll see you, yeah?”

“Nice meeting you, Sirius!” Ros shouts from down the hall. Sirius is halfway out the door and can’t see her.

“You too,” he says, not quite loud enough for her to hear, eyes fixed on Remus’ face. Then he turns for the stairs, feeling as if submerged suddenly in fog.

He stops outside the building to stuff as many of the bottles into his backpack as he can fit — two. His phone buzzes. It’s likely almost nine. He thinks about texting Dorcas **_is it too late to join you guys? x_** , but the first message on his lockscreen, from James, makes him reconsider.

**_James: lol dorcas insta story is totally indirecting you_ **


	3. Mine says Cock

**MONDAY 8:55**

_Ros Fraser_. For reasons Sirius can’t fathom, Benjy is a mutual Facebook friend.

He sits on a bench in the schoolyard with her Facebook page pulled up. Her profile picture is filled up entirely by her and Remus’ faces, adjacent and squished together at the cheeks, her tongue out, his eyes crossed.

A wind of sickly-sweet perfume hits Sirius before Mary does it herself, skidding onto the bench with such momentum and gusto that he slides over a few inches. He rapidly turns his phone facedown on his leg, meeting the eyes of a chipper Mary.

“I’m here to induct you into the Garden Hoes inner circle,” she whispers.

Sirius cranes his head toward her, unblinking. “The what?”

“It’s exclusive.” She smiles at him, all white teeth. “I went to the greenhouse this morning, Sirius, and I nearly _swooned_. It looks brand new! Like out of a catalogue! You could _eat_ off that floor!”

Sirius wrinkles his nose. “I don’t think —”

“So thank you.” She smiles with big, batting eyes, squeezing his leg. He moves his phone to his other thigh. “You have no idea how much I appreciate your hard work, you and Remus both. Do you know how _important_ your help is? To me, the girls? The school? They’re going to thank you for it. We all are.”

Sirius says nothing, because that sounds about as ominous as _God will punish you for this, Sirius_. His mother never did specify in what medium he should be expecting the punishment, so he reckons it’s possible God followed through and he never noticed.

Mary waits for a response that never comes, then clears her throat. Her voice is like an animated chipmunk’s squeak when she resumes talking. “So! The inner circle. Meeting today, half two. Greenhouse. Tell Remus if you see him, too. You’ll be there, yeah?” Her fringe swishes against her forehead as she tilts her head.

James, Peter, and Benjy appear in Sirius’ distant peripheral vision. Suddenly, he needs Mary to leave. “Yeah, alright.” When Mary’s reaction is to beam in excitement, he decides on impulse to wrap her in a hug so when he stands, he forces her onto her feet. “Brilliant. Okay. See you there.” He lets her go, steers her in the direction of the school, and off she goes, slightly frazzled but satisfied.

“Are you fucking serious?” Benjy hisses as he falls upon him, clutching Sirius by the shoulders. “First you go completely AWOL on Friday, then you feel up my girl?”

“I’m sorry!” Sirius breathes, pressing his palms to Benjy’s chest. “I’m sorry about Friday, fuck. I am. I had to… my rent’s been overdue for weeks to Gil, my mum was being a pest about my inheritance…” He shakes his head, eyes pleading. “I’m sorry.”

“Calm your teets, Ben,” James says, off to the side. “Mary wasn’t even over Dorcas’. It looked on Instagram like it was only her and Alice, anyway.”

Benjy assesses Sirius from head to toe, unhands him. “Why were you all over her just now?”

Sirius shrugs. “I cleaned out the greenhouse last week. She was being all… _happy puppy_. Thought it might get rid of her.” When Benjy still looks skeptical, he adds, “Listen, mate, my hands didn’t go anywhere near her arse.”

Benjy eyes him warily, then stalks past him with a sigh. Peter smiles hesitantly at Sirius and follows him. James, however, nudges Sirius on the shoulder as he moves to stand beside him.

“Did you get your rent in?” he asks.

Sirius’ eyes find James. “Hm? Oh, yeah.” He shakes his head a bit. “She wasn’t answering any of my messages or calls. Had to get to her through Regulus, and even then she demanded I send her a fucking bank statement to show I’d earned my share this month.”

James exhales through puffed cheeks. “As if your uncle never left that money in your name.”

“Right.”

Sirius feels James’ eyes on his profile, and then his arms slings round Sirius’ neck. “Lit awaits,” James says jauntily. Sirius lets James guide him to the classroom, Ros’ Facebook page still open on his pocketed phone.

**MONDAY 14:43**

When the greenhouse door slams behind Sirius, Mary freezes in the middle of the room like a deer in the headlights, wild eyes fixed on him. “What are you doing here? Get _out!”_ she shrieks, and as Sirius begins to raise his arms in a show of surrender, she suddenly relaxes. “Oh, shit. I invited you. Come in, Sirius.”

“Jesus, Macdonald,” says Marlene, dragging a white tarp across the floor. “There’s chill pills in my bag if you need one. Or more.”

 _“Jesus, McKinnon,”_ mocks Mary. “You know I don’t take drugs.”

Marlene smirks, giving Sirius a look that implies mutual understanding, but he barely knows her. She edges past him with the tarp and disappears outside.

A brief scan of the greenhouse reveals two of the four walls lined with fold-out tables. In a corner, Evans and Amaline sit upon one of them, hunched over a laptop.

Sirius can only stand useless in the doorway for so long. “What’s happening in here?”

“Inner circle meeting turned work session,” explains Mary, unloading coils and coils of white crepe paper streamers from a plastic bag. She tilts her chin up, seeming to have a gander at the ceiling. “How the hell will I get these up there?” she whispers.

Sirius sticks his thumbs into his pockets, traipses closer. _Working on…?_ Evans only then tunes in, handing the laptop to Amaline. “You let _Black_ join the inner circle?”

Sirius’ shoulders’ slump in exasperation. “What is it, exactly, that you have against me?”

“You’re associated with both the school’s biggest pervert and wanker,” says Evans.

Sirius blinks, then lifts his forefinger. “Is James _both_ , because —”

“Fenwick and Potter,” mutters Evans. “And you, _you_ smoked all my pot.”

Sirius winces outwardly. He’d forgotten about that. “James likes to put on the wanker image, but in reality, he’s —”

“To be fair, it was _our_ weed, not yours.” Marlene reenters, rolling up her sleeves and approaching the ladder propped against the wall. Sirius’ defence goes ignored. “And I wouldn’t mind having a personal indebted servant.”

Sirius smiles, then mulls over her words. “Wait —”

“What you could do for me, Sirius, is break up with your girlfriend.” Marlene stands the ladder upright so she needn’t hold it. “Ever since Gid found out I was bi, any chance he gets, he goes off about having a threesome.” Marlene looks Sirius up and down blankly. “And your girlfriend is fit.”

The cogs in Sirius’ brain are still creaking slowly — “My _girlfriend?”_ _Marlene is bisexual?_ — when Evans laughs and says, “That’s not how it works, Marlene.”

Marlene shrugs and grips the ladder again. “I thought I would give it a shot.”

“What makes you think Dorcas would want to shag you and Gid?” asks Evans. Mary looks between them all, nose crinkled.

“I didn’t know you were bi,” says Sirius. Marlene smiles at him.

“Yeah, well, you wouldn’t, would you? I’ve only ever dated boys, and I don’t exactly keep you posted on my sex life, _Sirius Black_.”

“That’s convenient, innit?”

The ladder screeches across the floor as Marlene drags it, and then she stops. “Convenient?”

Sirius shrugs. “You’ve pretty much been straight this whole time.”

Marlene’s playful smile fades. Sirius feels unsettled as her eyes rake over him. “Sirius,” she starts, acerbic, leaning into the ladder, “I’m bi when I’m dating a boy, I’m bi when I’m dating a girl, I’m bi when I’m dating anyone. I’m bi when I’m dating no one at all. I don’t — I don’t just _stop_ being attracted to girls if I decide to date a boy. Or vice versa.”

Sirius wants to apologise, say something, _anything_ , but all he can do is regard Marlene with teeth clamped down on his lower lip, and then Mary proposes, “Like if a gay bloke was dating a girl, he’d still be gay.”

At least this gets Marlene to look away from Sirius. “Sure, Mary. Christ, I need a cigarette.” She drags the ladder outside. Sirius is stranded in a greenhouse with three silent girls, cheeks hot, but then Mary seizes him by the hands, hounds him away from the door.

“Help me hang streamers, Sirius.”

Sirius thumbs at the white crepe. “Won’t that be a bit… I feel like they’d get damp, with all the plants —”

Amaline hoots out a laugh that startles everyone including Evans. “What?” says Amaline. “Sirius still thinks we’re mothering a plant nursery.”

Mary’s eyes widen. “Oh,” she breathes, then squeezes Sirius by the wrists. “We’re throwing a party, Sirius,” she says softly, as if speaking down to a child. “A greenhouse party. This Friday.” She nods slowly, looking from one of his eyes to the other, then looks blankly past his shoulder. “I need to make a Facebook event,” she says distractedly, shoving a streamer roll into Sirius’ hands.

Sirius, eyes narrowed, turns toward Evans and Amaline, clutching at the roll. “You started a gardening society to throw _parties_ in the greenhouse?”

Evans gives him a strange look. “None of us actually likes to garden, Black.”

“Ah.” He’s vaguely impressed.

**MONDAY 23:50**

Gil’s electronic music pulses through their adjoining wall for the second hour now. Sirius has learned, in the few months that he’s lived there, that this means hardcore sex is happening on the wall’s other side. He knows better than to open the door a crack and scream and beg for him to turn it down as not to risk losing his eyesight.

He puts his headphones in, lies sprawled across his unmade bed. When he unlocks his phone, the Facebook app is still open to Ros’ profile. He stares, nostrils flaring, then brusquely locks his phone and snags his laptop from the floor.

He’s only managed to type _sexu_ into an incognito window when _sexuality quiz_ autocompletes. He contemplates a beat before jabbing _return_. Sirius’ cursor hovers on the first search result before he thinks, _what the hell gives Buzzfeed or fucking ‘allthetests’ the authority to decide my sexuality?_ _Nothing. Absolutely nothing._

Sirius stands up to lock his bedroom door. Benjy and James share porn sites in their group chat more often than not. He knows to which site to navigate, doesn’t have to look up _boobs.com_ like he remembers Peter doing in year seven.

He sits in bed, legs parted with his laptop on the mattress between, headphones in. And watching does nothing to him but make him want to shrink back into his own skin; stilted dialogue, panties slipping off rounded hips, vulgar, exaggerated noises of pleasure. He runs the heel of his hand over his crotch, the thin fabric of his boxers, leaves it there. Then he tears out his headphones and slumps against the pillows.

He texts Dorcas **_can we talk tomorrow? x_ ** and she doesn’t respond.

**TUESDAY 16:08**

The girls’ hockey team jogs laps around the school, meaning every five minutes or so, they’ll run by in those skorts Benjy openly drools over. The threat of being beaten to death by Lily Evans and her hockey stick isn’t exactly unrealistic, so James casts his eyes elsewhere whenever they pass and looks up in time to watch Evans’ skirt flutter against her bum — also in time to catch the middle finger she slips him behind her back. Sirius smirks and elbows James (bad idea, he gets a bruising jab in the ribs). Peter is too shy to openly gawk, though the ambivalently-flickering gaze beneath his eyelashes isn’t so covert, either.

Benjy lets loose a wistful sigh, then clears his throat. It’s with an air of expectation that James, Sirius, and Peter should look his way. “Am I the only one who’s had that dream… the one where you walk into the girls’ locker room and the showers are on so it’s all steamy, and the whole hockey team’s there, waiting for you —”

“No, I’ve had it too,” mutters Peter.

James snorts. “What about Mary?”

Benjy lets his head sag over the back of the bench once the hockey team disappears around the corner. “Mary is yesterday, and today, my options are open. I don’t have the headspace to — to _pine_ after her —”

“There’s plenty of space in your head,” Peter refutes.

James hoots a laugh. “Pine?!”

Sirius, in the midst of picking at a cracked nail, peers around James to find Benjy. “Hear how he laughs, Ben? You can’t claim you pined after Mary, not in front of the king of pining himself.”

James nods along until he realises he’s been made a fool of and thwacks Sirius on the back of the head. It’s enough force to have him stumbling off the bench, having been seated on its back.

Naturally, Sirius lurches into the path of Dorcas and Alice, striding past elbow-in-elbow. Dorcas looks down her nose at him like he’s bloody roadkill smeared across a street, gives a passive tug to Alice’s arm, they continue on their way. On the ground, it takes Sirius a moment to decide he isn’t actually roadkill and _can_ leap up and jog after her.

“Dorcas,” Sirius breathes. He falls into step with her and Alice, desperate to catch her eye. “Please, can you give me a chance to —”

“Not responding to you should’ve made it clear enough, Sirius,” she says tightly, then turns her head, likely to make a face at Alice out of Sirius’ line of sight.

Sirius grimaces. “I — actually, that only left it open-ended, and now I’m here and I’m —” He skips a bit when they speed up to keep their pace. “I’m begging you, please, I just need a minute, or else I’ll follow you wherever you’re going and I don’t think you’d like that much.”

She stops short so fast that Alice, tethered to Dorcas’ elbow, trips backwards. She checks the time on her phone, gives Alice an unreadable look until she steps aside. “One minute,” Dorcas says flatly, not meeting his eyes.

Sirius exhales deeply and nods. “I’m sorry about Friday,” he murmurs. It’s a pitiful start. “I’m sorry. I admit I was… I was putting it off all night, heading to yours. I lied to the lads, told them you’d cancelled it.” As he stares past Dorcas’ shoulder, he finally feels her eyes on his face.

“Why would you do that,” she asks, quiet.

“Because —” Sirius wrinkles his nose, then looks at her, all despair, desperate for his brain to supply something that won’t come out sounding like utter bullshit, desperate for his mouth to comply. “Because I wanted it to be just the two of us. I thought that maybe, if it was me and the lads and you… who knows what would’ve happened. James is good at getting what he wants —” Dorcas is new enough to know that there’s one glaring case in which this isn’t true — “and Benjy’s good at being _obvious_ about what he wants, or _who_ , rather, and I’m…” He bites his lower lip, rolls it between his teeth. “Just, we’d only snogged and barely spoken and who knows what you would’ve thought by the end of that night.” He holds his breath, holds Dorcas’ gaze to gauge his vindication.

Her brow is scrunched with indecision. Once Sirius has counted out ten seconds of silence in his head, he reaches carefully for her hand, pressing the side button on her phone to light the screen. “It’s been a minute,” he murmurs.

Then she smiles, soft lips and sad eyes, and steps closer to him. “Sirius.” Her hands touches his cheek. “You do know the reason I invited you and your friends was that I wanted to see _you_?”

Sirius is so shocked she’s bought it that he can barely speak.

Dorcas giggles, probably at the wildness in his eyes, and kisses his slack lips. His eyes stay open, and from their corners, he can see the lads going mad on the bench; James is miming tearing out his hair. “You’re an idiot sometimes,” whispers Dorcas against his mouth. The next time she kisses him, Sirius has the decency to return it.

Or at least purse his lips against hers.

“You don’t have to be jealous of your friends in _advance_ , Sirius.” She swipes her thumb gently over his cheek, then sighs and lowers her arm. “But just to really get it in your head, I think you’re the fittest of them, whether or not they’re around.”

Sirius half-smiles at the odd nature of the compliment, then hesitantly reaches to take Dorcas’ hand. “In that case, would you… there’s a party in the school greenhouse on Friday night. Top secret, hasn’t been announced yet, but I’m somewhat of an insider.” Dorcas arches an eyebrow at this, but she’s still smiling. “Will you go with me?”

Dorcas’ hand is limp in his until she squeezes back questioningly. “Depends. Will you show up?”

Sirius snorts, tilts his head to the side, and nods. When she gives him a teasingly doubtful look, he pulls gently on her hand, though apparently it’s enough to propel her closer, close enough that they’re almost nose to nose. Sirius crosses his eyes playfully and nods again, this time with definitiveness. “I will show up,” he states.

“Yeah?”

Her perfume is cloying, but her eyes are warm and brown. Sirius clears his throat. “Yeah.”

Dorcas hums, then draws away. “I need to get the next bus.”

“But I’ll see you Friday?” Sirius’ hand is clammy when he sticks it back into the pocket of his leather jacket.

“If this greenhouse party is a real thing.” She backs away from him with a skip in her step. Alice, who takes Dorcas’ arm again, gives Sirius a distasteful look.

“You think I would lie about partying in a greenhouse?”

Dorcas laughs as she and Alice walk off.

Sirius sits down beside James, properly this time, without any danger of toppling off. Benjy gapes at him. “What _fucking_ sorcery,” he hisses.

“Wiles,” mutters James.

 _Dumb luck_ , thinks Sirius.

“Hi.”

Sirius feels all the blood in his face rush to his cheeks. Remus stands not three feet away from the bench with his eyes on Sirius, then also nods at the other lads. Benjy doesn’t pay him any attention as the girls’ hockey team is jogging by again, but James looks slowly between Sirius and Remus.

“Hey, mate,” says Sirius, delayed.

Remus huffs something like a laugh, then extends his arm. Between his fore and middle fingers he holds Sirius’ lighter — pinched against a folded slip of paper. “I thought you might want this.”

James perks up beside Sirius. “Hey, mate, you found it!” There’s a beat of bemusement after which he glances at Sirius. “I didn’t know you’d lost it.”

Sirius takes both the lighter and the paper. It’s the lighter he hasn’t seen since Friday, the lighter he’d left at Remus’ flat and used to light Remus’ joint; brass, engraved with the cursive word _Knob_.

When Sirius says nothing, James fishes in his pocket for his own. “Mine says _Cock_.” He smiles pleasantly at Remus.

“I still don’t understand why mine had to say _Willy_ ,” Peter interjects.

“I must’ve left it in the greenhouse,” Sirius says. He nods tensely at Remus. “Er, cheers.”

Remus doesn’t flinch at the blatant lie and nods back with infinitely more ease. “Sure, mate.” He scans the other lads again with his crooked smile and saunters away.

James waits until Remus is sufficiently far off to whisper, “Do we know him?”

Sirius shakes his head, unfolding the slip of paper. “No, he’s new. Year above us.” It’s the secret alphabet from Friday night, with a notched, torn edge from where the paper had been ripped from Remus’ sketchpad. Below the alphabet is an encoded five-letter word.

“Can’t believe you’d just go and lose your friendship lighter like that, mate.”

Sirius scoffs and shakes his head, ignoring James. He translates the word with a hasty eyeballing of the alphabet. _Yours_.

The lighter, presumably.

“How the fuck did you not realise? I’m fucking _hurt_ , Knob.”

“I have other lighters.” Sirius refolds the paper and tucks it into his pocket. He still has Remus’ borrowed clothes sitting in his hamper at home. _If he’d asked about them…_ “And we’re not all chainsmokers, Cock.”

“I think James’ should’ve been…” Peter pauses. “What’s a singular word for ‘small prick’?”

**FRIDAY 21:25**

Despite the location on the Facebook event for _ILLICIT GREENHOUSE PARTY_ having been specified as ‘the greenhouse behind the school,’ nobody arrives quite on time. _I didn’t even know we had a greenhouse_ , most of them say. For a while after nine o’clock, Sirius stands with Amaline outside the greenhouse, squinting into the looming darkness to wave over the confused party-goers wandering the school grounds. Before allowing them entry inside, Sirius and Amaline perform hasty face painting jobs on everyone with pots of glow-in-the-dark body paints; a penis on James’ cheek when he requests a flower — a _lily_ — war paint stripes on the cheeks of most when Sirius runs out of ideas. He asks Amaline to do his own and isn’t so pleased with the crooked streaks on his cheeks that look like a cat’s whiskers. She smears a dot onto the tip of his nose for good measure.

The white tarps Marlene had been messing with when he’d last paid the greenhouse a visit now hug the structure’s two longer walls on their outsides, secured so it more closely resembles a great, white shed. And inside the greenhouse, they serve as screens for projected videos of rolling, sunset-splashed clouds, as if the greenhouse isn’t planted on the ground and soars somewhere 20,000 feet up in the air, like some windowed space vessel.

Evans, of all people, comes to relieve Sirius of door-duty, allowing him to slip inside and throw back what he thinks is just a slurry of vodka and orange juice before Dorcas arrives. She has a dot of neon pink on the apple of each of her cheeks and kisses Sirius hello on the mouth, even while they’re jostled by the romping bodies around them. She links an orange glow stick around his neck and leads him away from the dancing, nearer to the wall where it’s calmer.

She stops within the scope of the projection so half her face is lit by orange clouds. Sirius smiles absently, leans against the wall, and in turn, Dorcas leans into him. She smells like her sweet perfume and wine, wonders just how extensive her and Alice’s pre-drinks had been. Her arm snakes around his like a boa constrictor.

“Hell _ooooooooo,_ _London_!” bellows a voice above all the rest, above even the music, and Sirius winces, doesn’t need to seek out its source to recognise it as Gil’s. He’s on the shoulders of someone ridiculously muscular, has neon zebra stripes painted across his face, and once his stocky partner’s set him on the ground, he breaks out into a series of flailing dance moves Sirius knows too well. When he’d first moved into their flat a few months ago, he’d come home on his third night to find Gil in full on performance-mode bouncing on Sirius’ bed in nothing but a silken dressing gown. Supposedly Sirius’ mattress is springier than his own.

“Who _is_ that?” Dorcas laughs, delighted.

Sirius shakes his head. It thumps against the window as he lays it back. “My roommate. He doesn’t even go here anymore.”

“ _He’s_ your roommate?”

Sirius nods, peering down at Dorcas with a little smile. As if on cue, when Gil smashes his lips to his companion’s, Dorcas squeals and shouts, “I knew it! I _knew_ he had to be gay!” She tilts her chin up to look Sirius in the eye. “Gay blokes are always the craziest.” A wine-loopy smile.

“You knew, did you?”

Sirius’ eyes flit above Dorcas’ head to see Remus has assumed the space beside her. He then looks at his feet, but even with some Rita Ora tune pounding away and Dorcas in between them, he can still make out Remus’ calm voice as if resonates on a frequency of its own.

“Hi, you! You’re… _Remus_ , right? From the first greenhouse meeting?” Dorcas grins at him.

Sirius drains his cup, peers at Remus from the corners of his eyes. Remus is already looking at him, eyes oddly neutral. Dorcas draws his gaze away and he nods at her. “You know you can’t tell who someone’s attracted to by the way they’re, say, dancing, yeah?”

There’s a quizzical lilt to Dorcas’ chuckle. “But I can _guess,_ silly.” Her boa constrictor hold loosens and her fingers lace between Sirius’. “Are you here alone, Remus?”

Remus snorts. “No.” He rubs a hand over his chin, smearing a bit of glow-in-the-dark green across it from his fingertips. “Dorcas, I think you ought to… consider the homophobic subtext of a comment like —”

“What’re we talking about?” Ros curls her hand over Remus’ shoulder and offers him a sip from her cup that he refuses with a wrinkle of his nose. Remus looks to be formulating some dry response, but Dorcas is quick on the uptake.

“Hi! Dorcas,” she offers, full of pep, and Ros replies with a kind smile.

“Ros.” She peeks around Dorcas’ head. “Hi, Sirius.”

“Nice to meet you!” Dorcas looks between Remus, broodingly contemplative, and Ros’ friendlier face. She then takes the empty cup from Sirius’ hand and tosses it to the floor, replacing it with her own. “Let’s dance, yeah?” He’s dragged into the crowd with the hurled force of her tipsy, unbalanced weight.

Sirius bops along convincingly enough, twirls Dorcas around so her back is to his chest for a few seconds of respite from forced smiling. But when she knows all the words to an overplayed Billie Eilish song, and then the next Drake song that comes on, Sirius decides it’s no Taylor Swift. He’s lost Remus among the clouds and gyrating bodies. His hands find the bare skin at Dorcas’ waist to steady her as he leans in close to whisper, “Gonna get another drink.”

He accidentally loses her on his way off the dance floor. It’s as he’s cringing at that old one-hit wonder by The Wanted and pouring himself a gin and — he can’t find tonic water, juice will have to work — that the cloud projections transition from the hazy, warm, juicy tones of sunset into the pale whites and blues of day, illuminating the side of Sirius’ face… and the sight of Remus sucking on his girlfriend’s tongue. Sirius sets the juice down heavily and it sloshes over his hand. He has to physically resist a sudden urge to pound his fist against the grounding solidity of the table.

Sirius tries to look away, into his cup, but as he lifts his hand to lick the spilled juice from his thumb, the cloud-bright light catches on the whites of Remus’ eyes. His hands, fingers sprawled over Ros’ cheeks and fitted around her jaw, tilt her head to the side, _away_ , but they’re attached at the lips still. His eyes are open, though not wandering, and even in the half-light Sirius is convinced they’re on him. He sees a slip of Remus’ tongue and closes his own mouth over the tip of his thumb.

Remus watches him. Sirius scrabbles for a grip on the table lest his knees give out. His thumb tastes like orange juice and sweat and it’s dirty but Sirius is slow as he drags it from between his lips, lets it linger against the pillow of his bottom lip and the flat of his tongue.

Remus shifts his weight into the greenhouse wall and Ros follows. One of her palms presses to the glass beside Remus’ head, the other slides down his body, stalling by the waistband of his jeans, grazing over his crotch. Ros goes to nose at Remus’ neck, and then it’s realer than before, than ever, when Remus breathes, inaudible in the clamor but heavy by the look of the movements of his chest and throat. When Remus looks him over. Sirius sinks his teeth into the tip of his thumb.

“Sirius.” Appearing behind him, Dorcas shatters what Sirius might have sworn was a warp of space and time and sound swallowing him whole.

He faces her. Her brow is pinched as she squeezes his hand, still wet with the juice that’d run down the lines in his palm. “Alice can barely stand. I’m gonna take her home.” Sirius thinks he might nod and Dorcas says nothing further, vanishing into the dark masses. When he swivels to face the drinks table, a rowdy group occupies the space where Remus and Ros had stood. With a rather dramatic, pucker-lipped scowl, Sirius finishes fixing his drink and wipes his hand on his jeans. Then Evans appears, as if his night couldn’t get better.

“Do you have my sixty quid?” she asks right into his ear to ensure he hears.

Sirius gives her a look over the rim of his cup. _“No?”_

“Okay, then I need you to go outside and stop the people trying to get into the school to use the toilets or — like — shag in the classrooms, or something,” she says firmly. Sirius’ mind apparently takes too long to process this, because Evans then gives him an encouraging shove.

He still holds fast to his cup. “You want me to _stop_ them?”

She nods demandingly.

Sirius snorts, starts to raise his hand in question. “How?”

“Figure it out!”

So then he’s outside, attempting to simultaneously finish his drink and stomp across the distance between the greenhouse and the school, spilling half the orange juice mess down his shirt. _Might’ve thought about this before you held a party so close to the school, Evans_. As it turns out, the year thirteen couple attempting to climb through a cracked second-story window are absolutely plastered, and Sirius spends ten minutes of his energy on a _you’re drunk, go home_ speech that he thinks only persuades them out of pity for him. He leans against the cold brick of the school, watching to make sure they arrive safely at the distantly visible bus stop, when the telltale chequered siding of a police car turning onto the school’s front drive startles Sirius. After a moment’s hesitation, he breaks into a sprint.

The rumbling bass of the music inside the greenhouse could be heard a mile away, no doubt. Winded and harried, he finds Evans standing outside with Amaline, a joint burning away between Evans’ fingers that tells him she has no shortage of weed that he should be concerned about. But it’s beside the point.

Breathlessly, he explains, “Cop. There’s a — there’s a cop car at the front of the school.”

“What?” mutters Evans, bringing the joint again to her lips.

“The fucking police,” hisses Sirius.

Evans and Amaline’s heads whip toward each other. “Kill the music, I’ll get the lights,” Amaline mutters. Lily nods and stubs out her joint as she heads inside. Amaline drags Sirius in by the wrist as she shouts at all the others bumming about outside, smoking. “Cops are here, so either get the hell out of here or get inside.”

The greenhouse has emptied out considerably since Sirius had danced with Dorcas, but it’s still packed enough that Evans has to four-finger whistle twice once the music’s been cut to gather everyone’s attention. When the projectors turn off one by one — Amaline’s doing — they’re all bathed in darkness but for the weak fluorescence of glow sticks and paint on faces. “There’s a cop on the school grounds, so until they’re gone, everybody kindly shut up,” she says sternly. Sirius is tempted to applaud. There’s something oddly natural about Evans commandeering them all. Low murmurs fill the room and Sirius slinks into a corner, pulls out his phone. He finds several texts from Benjy to the group.

**_Benjy: LADS......_ **

**_Benjy: going_ **

**_Benjy: Home_ **

**_Benjy: With_ **

**_Benjy: ALICE_ **

Sirius stares at his screen with concern.

**_Sirius: Mate if she’s as drunk as I think she is don’t do anything_ **

Benjy’s response is almost instant.

**_Benjy: oh yeah i know. offered to help dorcas get her home. we’re on the bus_ **

**_Benjy: there’s vom on my leg_ **

Sirius snorts, taps his thumb absently against the screen. Lily shushes everyone when the hum of low conversation grows too loud.

**_Benjy: i got to hold her hair when she yakked in the street_ **

**_Benjy: but… it is the east and mary is the sun_ **

**_James: ur pathetic_ **

**_Peter: Who decided to go ‘get lit elsewhere’ when Lily didn’t say hi back when we got to the greenhouse_ **

**_James: yeah who?_ **

**_James: never met this guy_ **

**_James: was busy getting lit elsewhere_ **

Sirius scans the pitch blackness, trying to catch a sight of Peter’s face cast aglow in neon.

**_Sirius: Pete u still here?_ **

**_Peter: Yeah, sitting with Amaline and Lily_ **

**_James: wtf traitor_ **

A forceful downward tug on Sirius’ arm brings him to a panicked squat. In the light of his phone, he sees that it’s Remus, smiling faintly and settling to sit on the floor. Sirius continues to shine his screen on him, eyes narrowed. “What was that for?” he whispers.

Remus shrugs a shoulder, bright green still smeared across his chin. “It’s safer down here.”

Sirius huffs a quiet laugh and pockets his phone, seating himself. “Safer from?”

Remus shrugs again. “The police.”

“Mm.” Sirius looks ahead, crossing his arms over his knees. “Thanks for caring.”

There’s silence between them but not among the other idlers. Then Remus says, “So Dorcas seems into you.”

Sirius feels warmth crawl up the back of his neck. “Bit too much, I think. Though it’s my own fault.”

The room floods with light — not with clouds, but harsh, white overhead light. “Okay, cop’s gone,” announces Evans, her phone held to her ear as she stands on the drinks table. “But they might be back. Party’s over. Everyone who wants can go to Marlene’s.”

Remus and Sirius stand as Marlene whoops in response and ushers stumbling partygoers out of the greenhouse. Sirius glances at Remus, and instead of asking _where’s Ros?_ he decides to ask, “Are you go —”

A plucky Evans extricates herself from the crowd before them though Sirius doesn’t recall seeing her dismount her table pedestal. “Cleaning committee,” she says by way of greeting. “You’re staying here with me.”

**FRIDAY 23:56**

Evans and Amaline are outside, picking up discarded bottles and cups. Or Amaline is, and Sirius can see through the greenhouse walls where the tarp has slipped that Evans is on the phone, pacing to and fro. Remus and Sirius have filled their third bin bag with the contents of the floor. Sirius has on eight glow stick necklaces; Remus calmly insisted on putting each one he found around Sirius’ neck. As Remus ties the final sack shut, Sirius sits on the edge of a table. Remus sits beside him. Sirius can’t be sure whether or not it’s intentional that he lays his big, warm hand flat over Sirius’, but he’s certain he’s not getting all the oxygen possible up to his brain.

“We’re done,” says Remus, looking appraisingly out on the greenhouse.

Sirius hums. “And it’s not even tomorrow yet.”

Remus checks his phone — a few minutes off from midnight. “That it is not.”

Sirius’ eyes trace Remus’ profile. “Where’d Ros go?”

“Home. She has something in the morning.” Remus smiles faintly, leans closer. “And I don’t think college parties are her thing anymore.”

Sirius runs his tongue over his lower lip, drops his chin to his chest, eyes to his lap. He finds his legs swinging unconsciously. “You been together long?”

Remus makes a noise of affirmation. “Four years.”

“Four?!” When Remus nods, Sirius whistles low. “Four years.” He sucks his lower lip into his mouth, lets his eyes go out of focus on a distant spot by the door. “Four years, that’s… you could marry someone after that. Of course, you could marry someone after being with them for six months, or a day, or an hour, like a getting-hitched-in-Vegas type thing, but, like, you know what I mean —”

“I think our relationship’s on its last leg,” murmurs Remus. Sirius doesn’t mean to look up so fast. “And we both know it. It’s not that we’re bored, I don’t think. Or that we don’t still care about each other, or aren’t turned on by each other. It’s just… I think we’re growing apart a bit. Time goes on, interests change. When we started dating at fifteen, I don’t think _this_ is what she was expecting.”

What is _this?_ Sirius takes him in. He’s no aesthete, but Remus pleases his eyes. _Don’t say that out loud_. For the evening, Remus has forsaken his patterned jumpers for a crewneck sweatshirt, pilling if Sirius looks close enough. “Well, you’re not so bad.”

Remus’ lips part as if he means to gape but only gets halfway there. “Oh, thanks.” 

“Yeah, mate, anytime.”

The laughter between them is quiet, private, would be even if they weren’t the only ones in the sprawling, echoing greenhouse.

Sirius absentmindedly examines his cuticles. “It’ll be weird to be single after so long, don’t you think?”

“Yes, but I don’t expect I will be for long.”

Sirius scoffs through a wry smile, rolling his head and eyes toward Remus. “That’s not presumptuous at all.”

Remus quirks a brow, also smiling. “How is that presumptuous? I’m just… a man who enjoys relationships.”

Sirius narrows his eyes. “So you’re saying there _is_ or there _isn’t_ a girl you’ve pinned as your next missus?”

“Jesus,” Remus laughs. His eyes roam the greenhouse, land finally on Sirius. “I think the only way to answer that question is _no_.”

“You’re lying,” says Sirius for no reason at all.

“I am _not_ lying.”

Sirius searches Remus’ face but only finds amusement and a freckle beside his left eye. He huffs and looks down. “Sure,” he says, and when it comes out quieter than intended, he decides it’d be too embarrassing to repeat again and falls silent. His hand is hot under Remus’, though he’s not sure which of them the heat is coming from, or both.

He feels it first when their shoulders nudge together, then when Remus’ fingers curl over the side of his hand, fingertips pressing between Sirius’ palm and the table. And when Sirius looks, he’s there, leaning in so close Sirius swears the tip of his nose might brush the peach fuzz on Sirius’ cheek. His lips part on instinct and Remus’ breath is warm on his mouth and the greenhouse door flings open on its hinges with a metallic clang. Sirius jumps instantly off the table as Evans strides in, grateful to have a reason to move toward her that doesn’t look as if he’s purely running away from Remus until he realises her cheeks are tear-stained and her eyes red. He stops short in the middle of the greenhouse, eyes wide. Amaline comes in behind her.

“She’s —” Amaline begins, but Evans cuts her off.

“I told you I can say it myself,” she says icily. Amaline doesn’t react, instead grabs two of the bin bags Sirius and Remus filled and traipses out. “I’m coming home with you, Sirius.” He blinks, and then she’s quick to supply, “My sister’s there, it’s the only place I can go right now, alright?” She goes toward the door, where she slings her bag over her shoulder and tucks her coat over her arm. When he still hasn’t moved, she says, “Anytime soon would be great.”


	4. The greenhouse girls

**SATURDAY 10:01**

Sirius will admit it’s strange to see Lily Evans in a state of vulnerability like this.

Not that he ever assumed Evans couldn’t emote (aside from pride or anger) or couldn’t… _be vulnerable_ , he simply never figured he would find himself in the living room of his flat, seated on the coffee table as there’s no more room on the sofa which is occupied by Gil, who has Evans’ head in his lap, and Petunia — who Sirius supposes is also _Evans_ but never zapped the synapse in his brain that connected her to Lily until he saw her slink under Evans’ legs on the sofa to rub her feet like an actual sister might on the rarest of occasions.

Gil runs his fingers through Evans’ — _Lily’s_ — silky hair. Sirius stares into his coffee mug, which has since stopped steaming. The night before, he’d bussed home with Lily, gestured vaguely to the sofa, and fallen into bed. He only woke up a half hour prior and happened upon the dogpile on the sofa, no more enlightened as to the reason behind Lily’s tears than he’d been in the jarred afterglow of nearly kissing Remus. He sighs heavily. _Remus_.

“I don’t know how I was ever stupid enough to leave you guys,” murmurs Lily. Lily had lived with Gil and Petunia before Sirius moved away from home and assumed her open spot.

“It was a rather stupid move,” Gil concurs. “If only because you consciously chose to leave Tuney and I behind.” He hums. “A stupid move… and a _downgrade_. Look what they gave us in return.”

Sirius doesn’t have to look to know Gil’s eyes are pointedly on him, but he does anyway. He knows Gil well enough — that is to say, not quite that much, but _well enough_ — to understand the mean humor is for Lily’s sake.

“The downgrade says hi.” Sirius takes a sip of his lukewarm coffee and sets it on the table.

He goes ignored. Petunia asks, “How long are you staying, then? Is it gonna be like old times?” Lily’s yellow socks against the robin’s-egg blue of Petunia’s dress make for a nice palette.

“Well.” Lily sighs, shifts her cheek against Gil’s thigh. “I don’t want to impose. I would say _indefinitely_ , but, like —”

 _“Indefinitely?”_ Gil echoes. “I always thought you were too forgiving with him, but if it’s _you_ who’s run out on him, he must’ve really fucked up.”

Sirius thumbs open his phone and offhandedly asks, “Who?”

Gil shoots him a threatening look, but Lily isn’t fazed. “My boyfriend.” She winces. “Ex —? No, I don’t know right now.”

Sirius blinks. His grip loosens on his phone so much he almost drops it. “You have a _boyfriend_?”

“Had,” corrects Gil.

“Not quite,” mutters Lily.

Gil continues, “And you can’t just ask things like that, Sirius.”

The cogs turn in Sirius’ brain, albeit slowly. “And you _lived_ with him?”

“Seeing as I lived in this flatshare, Sirius, before I moved in with my boyfriend, thus allowing you to assume my spot, yes, it would seem so.”

Sirius lifts his brows. His eyes go out of focus on a patch of wall above Petunia’s head. “I didn’t realise,” he whispers, and then, louder, “ _James_ didn’t know. Doesn’t.”

Lily laughs, and it’s not even sardonic or wry, just light and amused, which washes a peculiar wave of relief over Sirius’ bones. “No, he wouldn’t’ve, would he? Potter’s fucking oblivious.”

Sirius wonders if he ought to risk telling James about Lily’s ex-not-ex if it means he’ll get to confess she’d referred to him in a light one might almost consider fond. He says nothing for a moment. Gil picks at a knot in Lily’s sleep-mussed hair. Petunia’s posture is rigid and ballerina-like; Sirius doesn’t think he’s ever seen her sit on the sofa.

He clears his throat, feels for his undesirable coffee. “So… he’s a dickwad, then? This ex-not-ex-boyfriend?”

Lily shifts so she’s got her hand pressed between Gil’s thigh and her cheek and smiles a tired smile. “I think that’s safe to say.”

“He’s always been a dickwad,” Petunia says under her breath. Lily doesn’t acknowledge it.

Gil purses his lips into a pout, onto braiding a lock of Lily’s bright hair. “Is it… also safe to say you’ll stay with us? Indefinitely? Infinitely? Forever?”

Lily huffs and smiles. “If you’ll have me.”

“Then you should have your old room back,” Gil says quickly, so quickly Sirius is mid-cringe at a fruit fly now floating in the muck of his coffee and doesn’t get a proper hold on the words before they nearly fly over his head.

“You’re kicking me out?” he blurts. “You can’t just — fucking kick me out!”

“By the lessee’s agreement, I could, as you’ve violated about six items in it since you moved in, including smoking inside, drying your clothes on the heater, missing your rent deadlines…”

Sirius’ jaw drops. “But you dry your shit by _hanging_ it on the ceiling fan! And how many times have I unclogged the damn toilet after you —”

Gil wrinkles his nose. “Chill, mate, I’m not actually kicking you out. I just think you should relinquish your room to Lily and… _indefinitely_ sleep on here, on the sofa.”

Sirius feels guilty for protesting — not when he looks at Gil, but when he looks at Lily. “So much for privacy.”

Lily starts to sit up, but Gil pushes her right back down and says, “Just tell us when you need a wank and we’ll leave the room, mate, it’s not that complicated. And you never get any action, so, like.” Gil shrugs. “Why waste four walls on you?”

“Gil,” Lily hisses, batting away his arms this time. “I’m fine on the sofa, seriously.”

Gil still directs his theatrical fury at Sirius. “Look at her, Sirius! She’s heartbroken, she’s breaking out all over her T-zone, she’s _homeless_ , how _cruel_ —”

Sirius stands up with his insect-ridden coffee, desperate to escape Gil’s tirade. “I suppose I owe Evans enough as it is.” He leaves the living room.

He hears Lily hum in thought. “I’d forgotten about that.”

Gil sounds disappointed his conniption was interrupted. “What was _that_?” he whispers. “I didn’t expect him to give in so easy. I’ve logged the times he sneaks his laundry into mine, and I’ve kept count of every time he’s locked himself out —”

“He owes me weed.”

“Oh.”

**SATURDAY 10:40**

Sirius shuts himself into his room under the pretense of immediately cleaning it up for Lily. If Gil wants him on the sofa, then Sirius will _be_ on the sofa, preferably within the hour and taking up as much space as he possibly can in his new… room.

There isn’t much to clean or hide; when he’d heard through Mary that Lily was on the hunt for someone to take up her rent, Sirius had snatched the opportunity from her bare hands and showed up a week later on Gil and Petunia’s doorstep with a singular suitcase and his rucksack. Gil had offered to help him carry up the rest of his stuff, but Sirius had said, _This is everything_. When capriciously moving out of his childhood home, there wasn’t much room in Sirius’ head to think about what he’d actually need. And as it turns out, it wasn’t much more than he could carry.

He eyes the bin. He should take out the garbage, at the very least. Change the sheets, perhaps. As Sirius regards his closet, he thinks that to truly push Gil’s buttons, he might consider dumping Gil’s Disney DVD collection on the living room bookshelf and making said shelf his closet if it is, after all, to become his bedroom.

 _Fuck’s sake, Evans had a boyfriend all this time._ _Had? Or has?_ But when Sirius goes to open his messages, he navigates not to James’ name but to the void of his and Remus’ message exchange. On a whim, before he can get flighty, he types: **_kudos to the cleaning committee on a job well done last night_**

And then it’s sent. Sirius stares ruefully at the screen. The feeling of his stomach turning so is medically concerning. His phone’s sudden vibration spooks Sirius out of his skin.

**_Remus: ;)_ **

**_Remus: How’s Lily doing?_ **

Sirius feels himself smiling so stupidly his cheeks ache.

**_Sirius: better, i think. I’m still in the dark about most of the shit that went down but she seems better_ **

He holds his breath, plows on.

**_Sirius: It was fun last night_ **

**_Sirius: party in a greenhouse and all_ **

**_Sirius: who would’ve thought?_ **

**_Remus: Give her my best, yeah?_ **

Sirius sits and waits for a further message for long enough that when it still doesn’t come, he abandons his phone on the bed and marches to his trash bin. He empties his ashtray into it, snags bits and bobs from the floor and desk that Lily might consider garbage but Sirius overlooks on a daily basis, and once he’s knotted the bag, he hears the indistinct hum of his phone against soft sheets. He rushes to it, taking the bag with him.

**_Remus: A good time was had by all…_ **

Sirius lifts an eyebrow at the ellipsis.

**_Remus: Though cut a bit short if you ask me_ **

He swallows his heart back down from where it’s leapt to his throat.

**_Sirius: what are you up to today?_ **

**_Remus: Busy, sorry._ **

It’s so curt that Sirius’ mind reels with a vaguely dizzying embarrassment. But the message is followed shortly by an image captioned with ‘ ** _:)_** ’ — a row of symbols in a familiar language.

Sirius has to dig in the bottom of his rucksack in search of the crumpled alphabet.

_C u monday_

With the bin bag thrown over his shoulder and a silly quirk to his lips, Sirius heads out of the bedroom and the flat. He only comprehends he’s being followed when a pitter-patter of footsteps catches up to him in the stairwell. It’s Evans, _Lily_ , now with her hair brushed though still in yesterday’s clothes. Sirius stops on the landing. “Hello?”

“What’re you doing?” asks Lily, who nods as if granting him permission to proceed.

“Garbage duty,” he states.

“Gil says you never take out the garbage.”

Sirius squints at Lily, then snorts. “Today’s a special occasion.” He shoulders open the outer door to a light drizzle that feels like cold pinpricks against his skin. Lily tags along on the gravel in only her socks.

“Thank you,” she says.

Sirius shakes his head. “I owe you, anyway.”

Lily laughs a bit. “Not this much.” When Sirius says nothing and tosses the garbage into the bin, turns to trek back to their building, Lily adds, “So you and Remus are mates now.”

Sirius doesn’t know what to do with his unoccupied hands. He stuffs them into his joggers pockets. “Yeah.”

“That’s nice. I think it’s nice you’ve clicked, ’specially since Amaline told me he’s been a bit lonely since switching schools —”

“Yeah, we’re mates. That’s it.” When Lily looks at him skeptically, Sirius just sighs and trains his eyes ahead. “Why are you being nice to me?”

“Why shouldn’t I?”

Sirius’ expression is deadpan as he holds open the door for her. Then she smiles sheepishly.

“Because I get a bed and you don’t.”

**MONDAY 11:05**

_1.3: Hardware. Logic gates and logic circuits_ says the whiteboard. Amaline’s laptop is propped open in front of them; they’re dividing their attention between their partner project onscreen and the problem sheet under their noses. Sirius’ phone is overheating with an onslaught of texts from James that he’ll deal with later. But among them all, his brother’s name stands in sharp contrast.

**_Regulus: Hey_ **

**_Regulus: Mum found shit on your old computer_ **

**_Regulus: I tried to say I’d gone on it and it was mine but she knew I was lying_ **

**_Regulus: Don’t ask her for money til she’s had time to cool down_ **

Amaline nudges her knee into his. “Did you get ‘A or B’ for three?”

Sirius blinks, dragging his eyes up his paper. “Just ‘A’.”

Amaline groans. “ _What?_ How?”

“Because I had ‘A or AB’ the step before that, and the truth of that depends only on ‘A’. So it’s just ‘A’.”

“Dammit, I forgot to distribute.”

Sirius tuts his tongue superciliously and bats his eyes. Amaline checks that the teacher’s back is to them, then flicks Sirius square in the middle of his cheek. Sirius’ head whips toward her, aghast, and he raises his arm, unsure of what his intentions are other than to possibly tickle her, before Amaline’s fingers close over his wrist mid-air. “I would advise against that,” she says evenly. “Touching my hijab is an omen of bad luck.”

Sirius’ finger’s twitch in her grasp. He frowns, in the middle ground between confusion and concern, and stares at his clenched hand. “For me or for you?”

“For both of us.” She sets Sirius’ hand on the table. Her eyes are so grave that Sirius is mildly unsettled as he turns back to his worksheet, only to find it gone.

“What?” he whispers, distraught, and checks his lap and the floor. Then Amaline giggles. Sirius’ head jerks upward.

“You fucked up on number five,” she tells him, comparing their answers side-by-side.

“ _How_ did you —”

“You’re not very aware of your surroundings.”

Sirius snatches his paper from Amaline’s grasp and skims the fifth problem. A beat of silence, and then, “Goddammit.” He hunches over his paper to fix it as Amaline snickers beside him. “And _now_ I realise you were taking the piss with the hijab thing.” She snickers louder, leans over her worksheet.

“So I’m flatmates with Evans,” Sirius says into the lapse of silence between them.

Amaline smiles faintly and without surprise. “So I’ve heard. I’m glad she has a place to go.”

Sirius hums. “Gil is overjoyed. Lily’s back and suddenly I’ve gone from flatmate to, like, the family dog that no one likes.”

Amaline snorts, doesn’t look up from her paper. “There’s an old doghouse in my backyard if you’re interested.”

Sirius drags teeth over his lower lip, wiggling his pen between nervous fingers. “Would you — would you be allowed to, like, live in a flatshare? Not just, like, _any_ flatshare, but… say it was with Gil and Petunia?”

Then Amaline raises her eyes. Sirius knows he’s barreling past _unclear_ and venturing into the territory of _oblique_. “Was there a question in there?”

Sirius snorts, nods a bit spasmodically. “Yeah. Er, is it, like, admissible in Islam? To live with…” He shrugs one shoulder. “Like, say, with Gil. Because he’s gay.”

Amaline’s eyes burn holes into his profile. “Honestly, if I had to choose between Gil and some heterosexual chav, I’d choose Gil in a heartbeat. Not necessarily because he’s gay, but because I like him as a person.”

Sirius breathes out, “Oh.”

“There are certain things my religion doesn’t condone, but it doesn’t dictate who I can and can’t be friends with. Marlene is bi and I love her to death, the same I do Lily, who is — well, I don’t really know what she is. I love them both to death all the same.”

Sirius’ nose crinkles as he mulls over his muddled thoughts. “What about all the hate?” He sets down his pen. “Like, gay men being… publicly tortured? In countries with a Muslim majority? I just don’t understand —”

“Sirius fucking Black,” exhales Amaline. “Sometimes you seem so smart with your robots and stellar marks that you make me forget you’re naive as shit.”

Sirius frowns at her. She pauses in thought long enough that Sirius has the time to think about defending his honor, but not long enough for him to voice it. “Nowadays, there isn’t a canonical way to practice Islam. Not in everyone’s eyes, at least. You can’t project the way some people choose to onto me. And…” She regards her nails, neatly manicured. “There’s so much wrong with our world, Sirius, that is rooted in custom and history and routine; in the fact that people have believed in certain things in certain ways for so long and are resistant to change. Sure, Arabic countries are homophobic, but nowhere does Islam prescribe homophobia. Far from it, actually. Being just and moralistic and not judging people for who they are or things they can’t change are far more important.”

Sirius’ vision is unfocused on the tabletop. Amaline sighs.

“There are cruel people in all sectors of life, Sirius. Cruelty borne out of ignorance… it’s everywhere. Christianity to the fucking Tories to —”

“My parents.”

Amaline’s face, once again, betrays no surprise. “Sure,” she murmurs, then shakes her head slightly. “I don’t think you meant it as an attack and you’re just shit at words, being a math kid, and all, but I shouldn’t have to explain myself. Or justify the fact that I have beliefs because you think some people out there gave _my_ beliefs a bad name when they really only gave themselves a bad name.”

Sirius gives a slow nod, scrubs his hand across his eyes. “Yeah, I didn’t — I’m sorry.”

Amaline shrugs. “Forgiven.” She hums for a moment in thought, scribbles down a response to the final problem. “This time.”

Sirius smiles a little. “I’m honestly terrified. You and your death omens.”

She returns the smile, her chuckle barely a breath. “Just think a little before you run your mouth. Where did that come from, anyway? You’re never so… personal.”

Sirius flounders and utters, “Er — my mum went off on my brother for something she found in his browser history.” When Amaline’s eyes bore into him, dark and warm, he pokes at her wrist with the tip of his pen. “He’s fine. He’s okay.”

“Mm.” Amaline sighs. “Your mum should try touching my hijab.”

**TUESDAY 12:23**

Sirius is on his way to the canteen to meet Peter, Benjy, and James when he unexpectedly careens around a corner into the common room. It's not because his internal sat nav abruptly crashed, but because James, _not at the canteen_ Sirius now realises, catches him by the elbow and hurls him toward a sofa. Then primly takes a seat beside him.

“You could've,” Sirius starts, rattled and barely regaining his bearings. “You could've texted me to meet you here.”

“Sensitive communications are best confined to in-person settings,” says James, dropping his rucksack heavily to the floor. “Lack of receipts that can be used against me, and all. _You_ told me that.”

There's a lapse in which Sirius regards him with silent interest. Then he angles himself toward James with cheek propped against hand and eyes twinkling. “ _What_ did you do?”

The skin of James' brow crinkles. “What? Nothing.”

Sirius blinks, then slumps against the cushions defeatedly, head lolling back. “Mate, the fuck, you got me excited —”

“Benjy’s birthday is on Friday,” James interrupts.

Sirius stares at a water stain on the ceiling. When his eyes cross, he shakes himself out of it. “You’re right, you are,” he murmurs eventually.

“I am.”

“That’s the sensitive communication?” His eyes roll to James. “That I forgot about Benjy’s birthday?”

“What — no.” James snorts. “I’d forgotten, too, ’til Facebook reminded me this morning.” He scoots on the sofa, close to Sirius until they’re shoulder to shoulder, then slouches against him in a manner that screams mimicry but Sirius knows isn’t. “But we should do something, shouldn’t we? Like… get him a stripper?”

Sirius tries to lean his head against James’ but has to spit out a mouthful of black hair. “With what money?”

“You’re right. Mum and Dad would have my head if they saw a credit card charge to _Strip and the City_ on their statement.”

Sirius chuckles. “A party?”

Then it’s James’ turn to ask, “With what money?”

Sirius shrugs a shoulder, the one James’ cheek rests against, as not to waste an opportunity to be a little shit. “If everyone — say, fifty people — brings alcohol, and themselves… that’s all we need for a party, innit?”

“Where’ll we find fifty people willing to buy their own alcohol and toast to Benjy at the end of the night?”

“Chances are less than half will actually _bring_ alcohol, so if you want to lower the threshold, be my guest, but you’ll be sober —”

“Hi, Sirius.”

Sirius peels open his eyes. It seems James had closed his, too, because he nearly elbows Sirius in the jaw rubbing the sleep out of them under his glasses. They both look up at Dorcas, who stands before them, hair parted into two puffy buns. “Hello,” he greets, squirming more upright.

“I… may or may not have heard something about a party,” she says, lips quirked at the corners as she rolls onto and off the balls of her feet.

When Sirius says, “Yeah, not happening,” James says, “Yeah, wanna come?”

James turns narrowed eyes on Sirius. “Mate, we need forty-six more people. Gotta start somewhere.”

Sirius merely sighs, shoving James’ weight off his body. “We’ve decided we’re throwing Benjy a birthday party this Friday without resources or guests,” he explains flatly to Dorcas.

She only looks giddier. “This sounds like an opportunity for party-planning.” She sits down beside James, sandwiching him between herself and Sirius. “We can ask the greenhouse girls! You know, Lily, Mary, them all, and I know some other year twelves from —”

“ _Mary_ ,” breathes James, seemingly ignoring the one name Sirius thought he’d latch onto. “We — we _need_ Mary Macdonald at that party. Even if she ignores Benjy the whole fuckin’ night, mate,” he gropes at Sirius’ shoulder, fingertips digging against bone uncomfortably, “He’ll be buzzing she’s even there.”

Sirius writhes under James’ hold, and Dorcas says, “I can ask her! She’ll come if I ask.”

“To _Benjy’s_ party? There’s no way she’d agree.” Sirius receives a frown from James for that, but it’s only the truth.

“She needs incentive,” agrees Dorcas, deep in thought. Abruptly, she whips out her phone, taps through several screens, the white light reflected in her dark eyes, and then looks at them both gleefully. “Next Wednesday’s Halloween. We can make it a Halloween party.”

“Like… costumes and shit?” says Sirius, slowly.

“Like costumes and shit!” agrees James, nodding gradually faster until his head is bobbing enough to shake his whole body. He claps his hands together and it echoes in the common room and a few heads turn but James pays them no mind. “Fuck, _fuck_ , yes, let’s do it. Dorcas, you’re a genius.” Then James leans back, hooks an arm around Sirius’ neck. “And you and I can finally go as Freddie Mercury and Jim Hutton.”

Sirius can’t help but smile and lace his fingers in his lap. “We both have too much hair for that.”

“Then we’ll be early-seventies Queen. I’m obviously Brian May. Benjy wishes he were Roger, but it’s his birthday, so we’ll give it to him without a fight. And Peter’s Deaky anyway.”

Sirius chuckles at what James leaves implicit. “We’re doing this then, yeah?” He peers over at Dorcas.

Dorcas’ returning smile is warm and soft in a way that Sirius doesn’t expect and he can only manage to mirror it with half the feeling. “If only because I get to dress up,” she says, shrugging her shoulders.

“Yes!” hisses James, pumping a fist, then slapping his hands down onto his thighs. “Okay, so, Sirius’ flat is too small, my parents’ll be home —”

“We can have it at mine.” Dorcas’ head cocks. “It’s only a few minutes from here.”

**TUESDAY 16:00**

Sirius is snapping a picture of the whiteboard — both the notes on polar coordinates and that night's homework assignment — when Remus walks into the classroom. Into the AS-level Further Maths classroom. The final bell's just rung and nobody filing out the door or packing their bags pays him mind as he weaves between students to reach the teacher with a polite, "Hi, Miss, do you have a moment? I just have a quick question.”

Sirius supposes it's on him that he simply assumed Remus wasn't in Maths. He knows next to nothing about Remus, after all. Favorite colour? No. What he's aiming to study, possibly or possibly not involving Maths? Out of the question.

Sirius keeps his head down as he strides by, but he doesn't get very far, because as he's slinging his bag over his shoulder and squeezing by Remus, their shoulders collide and Remus whirls about, breaking his conversation with Miss Sattler.

“Shit, mate. Sorry about that,” says Remus, then bends to touch the floor by Sirius' feet.

“You're... fine,” Sirius is muttering, brows in a furrow, but then Remus straightens to full height, takes Sirius' hand, and presses into his palm a folded piece of paper.

“Think you dropped this,” says Remus, curling Sirius' fingers into a fist around the paper, patting gently for good measure, and swiveling back to face the teacher.

With two backs turned to him, Sirius knows it's his cue to leave, yet it takes a few moments for his gross motor skills to reactivate. He backpedals out of the classroom, leans into the wall outside. With one hand he attempts to unfold the paper whilst the other unlocks his phone and thumbs through his camera roll in search of a picture, the picture he'd taken of his and Remus' secret alphabet, all with some measure of certainty.

The paper opens up to a message from Remus. Encoded. Sirius smiles to himself. He's only translated the first two letters — _Tm_ — when Remus exits the Maths classroom. He hesitates physically in front of Sirius, though his countenance is casual.

Sirius blinks. Flounders. “I — I didn't know you were in Maths.”

Remus smiles easily. “I’m not.”

Sirius' eyes flicker between him and the classroom door. “Then what did you —”

Remus quirks both eyebrows and starts down the hall before Sirius can finish his sentence. The hallway empties out as he watches Remus round the corner until he's left in an echoing silence. He deposits his bag on the floor and sinks down the wall to sit beside it and decode.

_Tmrw night, ur place this time? Don’t worry, I can bring the wine..._

**WEDNESDAY 19:17**

**_Sirius: Hey you_ **

**_Sirius: Person_ **

**_Sirius: I’ll share my location_ **

**_Sirius: Bring red please_ **

**_Sirius: Wine i mean_**

**WEDNESDAY 20:49**

**_Sirius: I have shit to smoke btw_**

**WEDNESDAY 22:02**

Remus read his messages a half hour ago yet there’s still no reply. Since seven, Sirius has been sat on his bed in the clothes he’d worn that day, ready to pounce should the doorbell alert him that Remus is downstairs, waiting to be buzzed in. And yet the only sounds from the other side of his bedroom door have been Petunia clicking past in heels on her way out to see her long-term boyfriend and Gil padding barefoot to and from the kitchen to empty Sirius’ designated shelf of whatever crisps he’s bought in the past week.

He stops sharing his location, wishes he’d done that sooner, and shucks off his jeans. He locks his door for good measure, in case Remus does show up and Gil lets him in so Sirius can pretend as if he doesn’t exist. He swaddles himself in his sheets. The longer the night wears on, the longer he stares into the darkness, flinching at every sound in his flat and out in the street and every white-blue flicker of his phone screen as James bombards the group chat with a verbose play-by-play of that evening’s Overwatch session with his German gamer friends. Sirius turns his phone facedown, lays with the blankets over his head until he can’t breathe and there’s sweat prickling at his forehead and neck and chest, when he rolls over and finally closes his eyes.

**THURSDAY 12:45**

Sirius’ rucksack is stuffed as full as it can be, zipper dangerously close to busting at the seams. James has come and gone, having delivered to him in a plastic Tesco bag the contraband from Fleamont Potter’s old attic-confined wardrobe that Sirius will be sporting the following night as Freddie Mercury.

“It’s not too late,” Dorcas sing-songs softly. She sits beside him in the Robotics lab, discordant with Sirius’ usually so familiar surroundings. Sirius shakes his head and fills his mouth with crisps so he needn’t verbally shoot down her suggestion a third time — forget Freddie, go with her as… whomever the married couple in ABBA are — _were?_

Dorcas sniffs, poking with a bamboo fork at the peas on her tray from the canteen. “Sirius,” she says, now more… _serious_. He looks away from his computer screen and at her, chewing expectantly.

She sighs as she meets his eyes. “Are we, like.” Then the eye contact shatters. She props her chin against her hand and spears a pea. “Are we together?” When Sirius doesn’t immediately react, she moves her chair closer. Sirius focuses on the soft rolling of its wheels. “Because I… I _thought_ that when you apologised to me, after the night you lied, I thought you were saying that you… that you liked me. And I like you, so —”

Sirius puts on a smile. “Do we have to go through the formalities?” he mutters, turning back to his code.

Dorcas doesn’t sound like she’s following. “What?”

“I mean, do you want me to _ask_ you to be my girlfriend, or can we just skip that?” He rubs a hand over his jaw, eyes not focused despite pretending to be. The words on the screen all blur into one. “We went to the greenhouse party together.”

Dorcas is silent a moment. “But if we were together, we’d spend time just the two of us. Like… on dates.”

Sirius shrugs. “We will. Just haven’t had the time.”

“Do you mean that?”

Sirius registers the question slowly, squinting first at the screen and then at Dorcas. She doesn’t look hopeful or happy, just doubtful. Sirius supposes she deserves to be, which is why he feels a knife-twist of guilt in his stomach as he nods quickly and says, “Of course.”

Dorcas holds his gaze for long, then smiles, just the corners of her lips quirking up. “Okay.”

Sirius’ brows lift. “Yeah?”

She reaches out to squeeze his knee. “Yeah.”

“Good.” Sirius touches her hand, sighs uneasily, and shakes the mouse when the computer monitor threatens to sleep.

“So… are you still against Agnetha and Björn?”

Sirius scoffs, wheeling to face the computer. “Yes, Dorcas, there’s no Queen without Freddie Mercury, and now if we’re dating, you and I, the lads can’t think I’m leaving them behind or some shit like that. I can’t just forget about them.”

The door to the Robotics lab screeches on its hinges and while Sirius doesn’t check who’s entered, he hardly needs to, because Dorcas’ hand clamps down harder on his thigh as she greets, “Hi, Remus!”

Sirius’ shoulders stiffen. His eyes close against the soft patter of Remus’ footsteps toward the table they’re sat at, opening them when he hears Remus’ “Hi.” He stands on the opposite side of the table from Dorcas and Sirius, ugly jumper and all, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, hair fluffy and feathery and eyes annoyingly fixated. On Sirius. The code on his screen is suddenly extremely interesting.

Remus perches on the edge of the table, letting his bag sag off his shoulder. “Can I talk to you, Sirius?”

“You’re not in Maths, so I have an inkling you’re not in the lab for the computers or robots.” Sirius can’t see it, but can feel it when Dorcas senses the tension. She reaches for her own bag and begins to rise from her chair, but Sirius catches her by the wrist. “No. Stay.” He lifts his chin, smiles a placating smile, and while she reciprocates, it’s with reluctance that she sinks back into her chair. “Whenever you’re ready,” says Sirius to Remus, though it isn’t quite so obvious who it’s directed at with his eyes cast down to the screen still.

He hears Remus lick his lips. “Right,” he whispers, and then, louder, “I’m sorry about last night. Something… came up —”

“And you should’ve texted, I know. Yeah, look, mate, it’s fine. We’ve been through this once already, I think.” Sirius’ lips purse as he examines his screen. “In here, actually. In this lab.” He chuckles, drags teeth over his lower lip. “I know how this goes.”

“Sirius —”

“Yes?” He looks at Remus directly, daring him to speak further.

“I thought we could do it on Friday instead, maybe,” says Remus, shifting in his disquietude.

Sirius hums. “Can’t. Busy.”

“Oh.”

“Sirius, it’s your friend’s party,” Dorcas says admonishingly. Then she tilts her head toward Remus. “You should come, it’s at my flat! Bring your girlfriend, yeah? She seemed cool — _oh!_ It’s a Halloween party, by the way, so — oh my god, the four of us, we’d be _perfect_ as ABBA —”

Sirius snorts, jaw tense as he eyes Dorcas accusingly. “I’m not going as fucking ABBA,” he mutters. “And, anyway, we can’t just keep inviting whoever.”

Dorcas blinks. “What? You think there won’t be space? Two people won’t make a difference, Sirius.” She gives Remus a friendly smile. “Can you bring, like, liquor? I have so many mixers and I wanna make cocktails.” When Remus nods vaguely, she says, “Perfect! I’ll friend you and invite you to the event.”

Remus lifts his bag. “Ros is a bartender, if you need mixology expertise.”

Sirius rolls his eyes. “Benjy won’t give a shit if he’s drinking a Dubonnet cocktail or vodka straight up.”

“Well, I’m hosting, and I’d like it if there were cocktails.” Dorcas evades Sirius’ gaze and smiles at Remus. “Thanks, Remus. Starts at eight. I’ll send you an invite. And — and get a costume!”

“Will do.” Remus holds Sirius’ gaze until he’s far beyond Sirius’ periphery, shutting the door to the lab.

For a few minutes, Facebook-friending Remus and inviting him to Benjy’s party preoccupies Dorcas. Sirius is quite literally saved by the bell, because just as she seems to be ready to demand, “What exactly was that?” the bell rings and Sirius powers down the computer and slips out of the room with a hasty, “See you, babe!” It’s a nice touch, he thinks. _Babe_.

**FRIDAY 20:30**

Sirius is sweating under his clip-in fringe and the padded shoulders of Fleamont Potter’s musty patterned blazer.

He’d arrived at Dorcas’ by seven, by which time her flat had already been brimming with people — namely Lily and her crew. Benjy wouldn’t get to his own party until later but already Mary Macdonald was drinking a beer on Dorcas’ couch, cat whiskers and nose drawn in black on her face and cat’s ears tucked into her bob. Sirius said something to James about having a stretcher ready for Benjy’s arrival but James had been tangled in the strings of the helium balloons he’d brought, begging for help and inadvertently ending any conversation about Mary before it’d even started.

Benjy is timely, though, makes his appearance at eight on the dot, and Sirius fulfills his responsibility for the night by providing him with his first drink of the night and making a toast to which Ben that only the lads and Lily’s friends cheer. Sirius can’t be too surprised, not when he barely recognises the others in attendance. He has nothing against strangers, though, less so when the ‘bar’ — Dorcas’ kitchen counter — is laden with bottles, opened and unopened.

He supposes he has Dorcas to thank for the turnout. Dorcas, who’s let her hair go untamed for the night and traded trainers for knee-high white boots and a shirt-dress and apparently stood her ground on ABBA, claiming she won’t be the only Swede at the party that night.

James looks every part Brian May but for the fact his resting face is in an exaggerated squint. He’s brought his glasses — Sirius can see their outline through the pocket of his linen trousers — but for authenticity’s sake refuses to put them on _unless someone I care about is dying within a five-foot radius of me_. Sirius reckons he’ll give in to his glasses by the end of the night, though, because Lily, or _Poison Ivy_ , is in a green unitard to match the leaves she’s artfully painted onto her eyelids and cheeks.

Sirius watches as down the hall from the kitchen, Dorcas ushers several more guests through the door. As he wipes the sweat from beneath his fringe, it’s like the bass of the music blurs and twists, as if the speaker has sunken underwater. Or then it’s just Sirius who’s under the water.

Remus’ hair is coiffed, tufts for once not falling into his eyes, _Ziggy Stardust_ lightning bolt framing his eye. He’s more modest than one might expect from David Bowie, but precisely the modesty Sirius has grown to expect from Remus, though he’s got on braces that strap his tight shirt closer to his chest and trousers that flare around mid-calf. Sirius is willing to guess they’ve been nicked from Ros’ closet, going by the length of her legs. Dorcas’ squealed words are indistinct but loud enough to be heard in the kitchen, because Ros has dressed as Dorcas’ blonde other half — _Frida and Agnetha_ , he’ll learn later. Sirius wonders just how quickly Dorcas had gotten to contacting Ros about matching costumes because he thinks they’re even wearing the same boots.

From the rucksack he always carries, Remus unsheathes a bottle of cheap whiskey. Dorcas guides them both to the kitchen where Sirius idles with James, a haven insulated enough from the pulsing volume of the music that Sirius can hear Remus’ laugh clear as day when James sing-songs, _“There’s a starmaaaaan,”_ upon their entry to the kitchen.

James holds out his hand as if to greet Remus like an old friend, and they make a little dance of smacking each other on the backs, James enthusiastic and Remus verging on _just going along with it_ until he’s released to deposit his whiskey on the counter. Then James leans over to hiss in Sirius’ ear, “That’s Fabian, right?”

Sirius doubles over in laughter, grappling at James’ shoulder as he shakes his head wildly. His fringe flies off, but he couldn’t give less of a fuck. “No, mate,” he wheezes. “Fabian’s in the other room with a horse mask on.”

James stares emptily ahead. “Fuck.” He promptly leaves the kitchen, knocking into the doorjamb on his way out.

Sirius smiles absently after him. There’s a brush of bodily contact as Remus leans against the counter on his other side, cup in hand. Sirius can’t possibly ignore him now. Dorcas engages Ros in lively chatter not three feet away.

“He’s friendly,” says Remus, nodding to where James had stood.

Sirius snorts, drums fingers against his empty, hollow cup. “In his defence, he thought you were someone else.” As he licks his lips, he ventures to peek up at Remus. “But in his offence, he consciously chose not to wear his glasses to be as _Brian May_ as he can manage.”

Remus’ half-smile is like home. Not Sirius’ literal definition of home, or old home, really, but the definition meant by most. Remus lifts his upturned palm, upon which Sirius’ fringe rests like some small, sleeping, furry animal. “You dropped this.”

Sirius bites the inside of his lip, takes the fringe and slaps it onto the counter, then shifts to face Remus fully. “Did I? Or is this another of your dirty tricks?” He sets his cup down. “Do Wednesdays exist in your little personal universe? It’s always on Wednesday when you disappear.”

Remus’ chuckle is but a soft breath. “It’s only been two Wednesdays,” he argues, taking a sip from his cup. As he lowers it, he looks from Sirius to the wall opposite and then back again. “I mean — _what’s a Wednesday?”_

“That’s what I thought.”

As they share a smile, Remus begins to look at him with what Sirius thinks is entirely sincerity. “All jesting aside, I — you wouldn’t have wanted to see me,” murmurs Remus. Sirius says nothing, hasn’t time to reply before Dorcas shoves a cup into his hands.

“ _Taste_ this,” she implores. “Ros just made it from all this crap. Crap to treasure!” Ros laughs, melodic, and as Sirius takes a sip, Remus gulps down whatever’s left in his own and seeks out the whiskey he’d brought.

Sirius nods halfheartedly, licks the sweetness from his lips. “It’s good,” he says, eyes helplessly tracking Remus. Dorcas slots herself into the now-unfilled space at his side.

“Told you I wouldn’t be the only Swede!” Dorcas leans into him. “Every time I brought up ABBA, this one —” _That’s me_ , Sirius supposes — “wouldn’t have any of it.”

Ros smiles and, once Remus has filled his cup, slides an arm around his waist. Remus holds his cup with both hands, expression unreadable. “But we all ended up in the same era, didn’t we?” says Ros, trying for optimistic.

Ros and Dorcas talk music. Ros, meaning to be inclusive, tries to rope Sirius in, asking after his taste. When he says, “Well, mostly death metal, with a spot of Taylor Swift,” Dorcas laughs awkwardly and calls him _silly_ and takes the conversation’s reins for herself. Remus doesn’t smile, appearing more at ease by Ros’ side after his second drink, but he doesn’t look away from Sirius once except to refill his cup.

Then Remus produces a joint from the cigarette pack in his pocket, lifting it as if in suggestion.

Ros’ mouth tenses. “Remus, no.” She says it quietly, almost privately.

“Love, we’re at a party,” murmurs Remus, sipping distractedly from his cup.

“It’s fine, really!” says Dorcas, perhaps too elated at Remus’ offer. “The neighbors usually don’t complain.”

Ros smiles tightly. “That’s not —”

“Yeah, the neighbors don’t complain,” Remus says knowingly to Ros, then winks at Dorcas as he tucks the joint behind his ear and tips the cup back again.

“I think you’ve had enough, Remus,” says Ros.

Remus is close to snorting the drink out his nose. “Can’t do anything, can I?” he laughs, wavering between shrill and normal octaves. He peers into his cup. “The whiskey is drowning in this coke, I swear it.”

Dorcas’ hand clenches around Sirius’ arm. When he unconsciously flinches in her grip, she tangles their fingers together instead. “So — so you’re both year thirteen?” she asks, just shy of openly begging for Ros’ attention.

Ros’ eyes don’t leave Remus’ profile. “No, I finished school last year. On a gap year while I decide what I should study.”

Dorcas hums with altogether too much interest. “Did you and Remus meet when he was in lower sixth and you were in upper?”

“We were in the same year,” says Ros. “Remus did poorly on his A-levels, that’s why he’s repeating.”

“Did poorly is an understatement.” Remus puts his cup down with finality. “ _U_ ’s all around.”

Dorcas seems frightened. “What… which exams did you take?”

“None of them.” Remus untucks the joint from behind his ear. When he wipes at the sweat beading on his upper lip — the air in the flat is humid with perspiration — he smears the point of his red lightning bolt.

Ros eyes the joint and whispers, “For fuck’s sake.” Then, “You know what? Just —” She pushes away from the counter, white block heels _clunk_ ing. “Where’s the toilet, Dorcas?”

Dorcas meets Sirius’ eyes, then jogs after her. “I’ll show you.”

The flicker of Remus’ flame leaves a lasting, amorphous mark in Sirius’ vision. It’s there, purple and translucent, floating by Remus’ face as Sirius watches him puff on the joint. “And then there were two,” says Remus around wisps of smoke, coughing once and taking Sirius’ wrist. “Let’s make it zero before they get back here.”

Remus yanks him out of the kitchen. “Where are we going?” Sirius hisses, but as they breach the kitchen doorway, Sirius’ voice fades between the music and the chattering, dense bodies. Remus keeps his hold on Sirius with one hand, holds the joint in the air with the other, far above everyone’s heads like a tour guide with their umbrella. It’s once they reach the door that Remus takes the joint between his lips, opens the door, and kicks it behind him so it doesn’t swing shut onto Sirius. Sirius, who stumbles into the eerily silent corridor behind him. The door slams and Remus releases his hand, eyes feverishly bright and smudged with the sweating, red paint of his lightning bolt, breathing smoke from the corners of his lips like a dragon-like creature. Remus nods toward the stairs, releasing Sirius. “Don’t suppose you’ve ever ridden handlebars before?”

Remus takes two stairs at a time going down, sometimes three. The man has a death wish. Sirius can keep up, though, if he hustles. “Like, on a bike?”

“Mhm.” Remus skims the handrail with his fingertips as he peers at Sirius over his shoulder.

“Er, no. On the back of James’ bike a few times, but not on the handlebars,” reflects Sirius. The ambient sound of the party fades the further they descend. Remus’ skip-like steps, hardened by the soles of his oxfords, echo in the stairwell.

“Okay, and… if I insisted that you ride on my handlebars?” Remus’ back is to him as he shoulders the door open on ground level.

Sirius arches a brow. In one gust, the cool night dries his sweat onto his skin. “I’d say you wanted to be a literal pain in my arse.”

Remus wheels on the ball of his foot to face Sirius, shaking his head earnestly and holding out the joint. “I just think it’s cinematic.”

“Film nerd,” mutters Sirius. He’s halfway through a drag when Remus lugs a seemingly random bike from a pile of them indelicately layered against the bike rack on the kerb. “Are we actually going?” He covers his mouth with the back of his hand when he coughs. “And is — is that yours?”

“Double yes.” Remus settles onto the seat. It’s too low — his knees bend, the soles of his feet touch the ground. He experimentally rings the bell, grins at the scintillating noise. “Go on.” He pats the U-shape of the handlebars.

Sirius approaches warily, tapping ashes from the joint and scanning Remus’ face. “Can’t I just sit on the back?”

“And have your face level with the middlemost knob of my spine? Think of the cameras, Sirius.” Remus huffs disapprovingly. And when Sirius hesitates: “Sirius Black, if you don’t get on my handlebars —”

“Shut your fucking mouth,” mutters Sirius, already in the midst of straddling the front wheel. “Take this.” Twisting, he offers Remus the joint, who takes with his teeth bared only to stub it out against the cold metal of the bike. When they lock eyes, Remus smiles with placid innocence. He’s so close, pores and the pinkish shade of his eyelids and his bitten lower lip visible under the moonlight.

“Just hop up,” Remus murmurs then, so Sirius faces ahead, boosts himself up onto the bars. When he wobbles, Remus says, “Lean back a bit,” so Sirius does until he feels the vague contact of Remus’ chest against his back, chin over his shoulder.

“If I slip, I’ll get wheel-burn on my cock,” Sirius muses, legs dangling apart on both sides of it. When Remus pushes them into motion, Sirius has a temporary _wh — augh!_ moment in which he doesn’t lose his balance. Remus’ hands, curled around the handlebars, are a frame for his bum. “And if you stop too fast, I’ll fly right off and into traffic.” Remus pedals slow, though fast enough for Sirius’ hair to blow backwards into Remus’ face. He can hear him blowing raspberries, knows it’s caught all over his lips. Smirks to himself. “How’s that for cinematic?”

“We’re not going far,” Remus assures him.

Every muscle in Sirius’ body is engaged — holding his legs apart, fingers clawed around the handlebars, back curved to seek out support from Remus. “Where are we going, then?”

“Nowhere new.”

Dorcas’ flat is less than ten minutes’ walk from the school. Biking takes less, and it passes quickly with Remus’ breath warm against his neck, the streets empty, the few unflappable pedestrians unfazed by Bowie and Mercury on a bike in the shoulder of the street. Sirius chokes out a laugh. “You wanted to leave Dorcas’ party… _to go to school_.”

“I would’ve gone to Millennium Bridge but your weight makes this bicycle rather unwieldy.”

“Sorry. It’s not like I was coerced, or anything, to sit on your handlebars.”

Remus’ grin is audible. “No, you weren’t.” The brakes squeak dangerously as Remus stops at the back of the school where the asphalt meets the grass of the yard.

Sirius steps off. “The fucking greenhouse —” 

Remus does the same. “— is our destination.” Then he allows the bike to clatter ungraciously to the ground.

“Why do you hate your bike?” Sirius asks, wincing at the weight of its metallic collapse.

Remus is loping across the yard toward the damn greenhouse when Sirius looks at him again. _It’s not his bike, you idiot_. Sirius jogs after him.

“Isn’t it locked.” Sirius’ question loses its inquisitive lilt by its tail end because Remus has the flashlight of his phone on and a credit card jammed between the door and its frame, maneuvering them both so deftly that the door swings open before Sirius can analyse any of it.

Remus tucks the card into his pocket. “After you.”

Sirius raises an eyebrow. Still, he goes in.

They’re far from the streets now, from the school, from any street lamps or car beams or storefronts to light their way. Sirius stands in the middle of the greenhouse, hands linked behind his back. He looks at the shape of Remus, who’s turned off his flashlight. “You’re batshit, y’know? Kleptomaniac, and — is there a mania for breaking and entering?”

Remus doesn’t answer. Sirius can’t even see him react. The moon hides behind a copse of clouds. Into the silence, he says with a shrug, “Could use some light.”

Remus’ black silhouette moves toward him with assurance now, swift and wordless so Sirius’ gasp is half fright when Remus comes upon him and squeezes Sirius by the arms like he’s trying to scare a child. “Jesus,” hisses Sirius. “Don’t do that.”

Remus’ laugh is low and warm. He must be bending over; his forehead presses to Sirius’, then disappears when his hands do. “Are there overhead lights in here?” he asks, voice growing distant.

Sirius clears his throat. When he closes his eyes, it’s pure blackness; his rapid heartbeat echoes in the hollows of his ears. “Yeah, I… I remember I hung streamers from them before the party.”

Some shuffling, Remus’ hushed swearing. “Can’t find the light switch.”

Sirius rolls his eyes and fumbles for his phone, opening his mouth to say, “Use your —” but he squawks instead, because out of the dark above, a viciously cold mist showers upon him, wetting his neck and dampening his hair.

“Why are you screaming?” mutters Remus.

“Because you fucking —!” Remus must flip another switch. No longer is the rain a gentle mist, but a persistent spray. It drenches Sirius before he’s finished his sentence. “You _bastard_ , that’s the fucking —”

“Irrigation system!” Remus supplies. Then the lights flicker on, fluorescently blinding. Remus is by the door, grinning, safe from the ceiling sprinklers. Sirius trudges toward him. Remus presses his back to the wall, laughing hoarsely and hugging himself. “Oh, oh _god_ , this is brilliant.”

Sirius tries to tell himself he’s angry. He’s cold, the wetness seeping down to his skin and chilling his bones, only more obvious once he’s in the dry zone. “Turn it off,” he demands, but the smile on Remus’ face is devious and sends an electric frisson from Sirius’ heart to his toes. Remus steps in the way of the switches on the wall. Sirius has to shove behind his ear the wet locks of hair tumbling into his eyes. Remus mouths _no_ as he shakes his head. Naturally, Sirius steps closer, lifting his hands. Slow.

Remus gives another warning shake of his head. Before Remus can move to defend him, Sirius plants his palms against the wall on both sides of Remus’ waist… if only to strategically reach the switches behind him. _Move_ , mouths Sirius, and Remus raises his brows, holding eye contact challengingly for _one, two, three_ until Remus scrambles to bat Sirius’ hands away. Sirius in turn swats blindly at the switches behind Remus, unwittingly killing the lights. The sound of the sprinklers persists, and Remus gets a grip on Sirius’ wrists, wrestles him under the spray again, and Sirius is breathing heavy, so heavy, no longer fighting against Remus’ hold but fighting for a hold on Remus.

The coiff of Remus’ hair wilts within seconds of the water soaking it, though Sirius can only tell from the deflated height of Remus’ dark silhouette. Sirius laughs faintly, without context, steps on Remus’ toe trying to crowd further into his space. Remus’ hands touch his waist, drag up the back of Mr. Potter’s soaked jacket, and that’s when Sirius realises his own hands are free, fingertips grazing absently over Remus’ elbows. He wishes he could see his eyes — Remus’ eyes, so expressive yet so sheltered — to see if _it’s okay_ when Sirius rifles fingers through the back of his hair, up to where it’s wet, matted, thick, so that when he squeezes he can feel the droplets trickle between his and Remus’ faces, distinct from the steady shower of the irrigation. Remus breathily chuckles, and Sirius pictures his smile, where his mouth might be, but he needs to know for sure.

Remus draws him in and Sirius is as muzzy as his knees as right then — wobbly, knowing only that Remus is close and there and occupying his whole headspace. He traces lines down the sides of Remus’ face, from his hair to his cheeks and jaw, following the guiding lines to his chin. _Please_ , he forms the shape of the word with his mouth, though he thinks if he can’t see Remus, Remus can’t see him. And yet Remus seems to respond instantly all the same, because he seems to close in around Sirius, envelop him, lean in deeper if possible, and now Sirius knows where he is, has his lower lip under the pads of his thumbs. _Was this your plan all along?_ Sirius thinks, and Remus’ laugh is warm on his hands and two-hundred percent coincidental and yet Sirius can’t help but think it might not be. Remus presses in, and Sirius knows his intention, steers him with his hands so they aren’t so completely off-target when their lips meet.

Sirius tastes the water skimming Remus’ cheeks, caught in the divots at the corners of his lips, in the dimple creasing his cheek. Remus kisses with intent — the first is lips on lips until Remus’ hands find his jaw in the dark and cradle him, steadfast and strong. He coaxes open Sirius’ mouth, thumbs drawing circles over the hinge of his jaw, and then it’s slotted lips, the soft pressure of teeth, tongues and urgent breaths drawn through noses. Sirius should be shivering at the cold cling of his clothes but under Remus’ warm touch he’s numb to it; he drags palms down Remus’ solid body, can feel everything through the damp shirt hugging his skin. He’s never felt so bottomless with need. Sirius feels Remus smile against his lips and that’s when he takes a breath, blinking water from his eyes, nudging the tips of his toes into Remus’ with insistence.

“You’re melting,” he whispers.

Remus only strokes his cheek. There’s a smile in his voice. “What?”

Sirius feels himself grin. “I can taste your face paint.”

“Hm.” Remus kisses him again. It’s in a way that has Sirius falling to fit into his every contour, arms around his neck, their legs tangled precariously. “Bowie no more. Shame.”

“Just you.” Sirius smiles. “How unfortunate.”


	5. Your bottoms are always soggy

**FRIDAY 21:21**

“I’m not riding handlebars all the way home.”

“Is that a quote from that _This Little Piggy_ nursery rhyme?”

Remus’ stolen bicycle is abandoned in the schoolyard. Despite wringing dry what they could at the bus stop, they drip water all over the bus floor, shoes squelching as they walk, on the receiving end of elderly glares as they shiver in their seats and cling to what warmth they can only because they can’t stop silent-laughing. Remus’ lightning bolt is a watery red streak down the side of his cheek and neck, and under the harsh white light on the bus, Sirius assumes what Remus thumbs off the corner of his mouth is also said paint. Remus sags against the window, Sirius against him, and the cold, damp material of Remus’ shirt feels as sickening under his cheek as his frozen toes and soaked boxers and still he wouldn’t trade the feeling for anything, not even when Remus’ shoulder begins to tremble with another bout of laughter.

They stumble off the bus when Sirius realises they’re about to miss the stop. Sirius takes off in a sprint, and although the wind whips in chilly lashes through his sopping clothes, the faster he gets home, the sooner he’ll be warm. It’s only a block of full-on running, and Remus keeps pace likely only because his legs are so long.

“So here’s my building,” says Sirius absentmindedly as he unlocks the door.

“Mm, I recognise it.”

Sirius swings the door open, blanching at Remus as he heads toward the stairs. “ _How?_ You didn’t —”

“Google streetview. You sent me your location.”

The empty stairwell amplifies Sirius’ laugh. “Creep.”

They tromp to the third floor, where Sirius lets Remus into his flat. “Hello?” he calls out into the darkness, then checks the time on his phone. “Fuck, it’s not even ten.”

“We’re alone?” asks Remus.

Sirius bites his lip, takes a slow step toward his bedroom. “Er… yes.” His eyes wind their way to Remus.

“Oh, good. So I can take all this off.” Remus shrugs the braces off his shoulders.

“Not out here, twat.”

Sirius doesn’t remember his bedroom ever being as neat as it is when he walks in; he’s both grateful to avoid embarrassment at Remus’ hands and ashamed he’s falsely projecting being tidy. “Come in,” he tells Remus uselessly, then hurries to twist the knob on the heater to _high_. When he turns, Remus has shrugged out of his shirt, holds it between pinched fingers, still damp and heavy.

“Sprinklers weren’t my best idea,” murmurs Remus.

Sirius’ lips quirk, and yet unconsciously, he doesn’t let his eyes stray below Remus’ collarbones. “Want a towel?”

Remus smiles, toes out of his shoes by the door. “And a change of clothes would be nice.”

Sirius nods, feels the tendrils of his cold hair brush the back of his neck. “Wardrobe’s right there, take what you need.” There’s not much space between Remus and the door, and still Sirius manages to squeeze past without touching him. “Give me a second.”

Sirius wraps the second-to-least-ratty, clean towel from the linen closet around his hair, grabs the least-ratty, clean towel for Remus. When he edges back into his room, Remus’ wet clothes are in a small pile on the floor and he’s standing by the heater, slipping into a red pair of Sirius’ boxers. He bumps the door shut behind him and silently approaches Remus, extending toward him the towel which Remus wraps around his shoulders as he takes a seat leaned up against the heater. Sirius can hear it crackling to life. 

“Come sit with me,” murmurs Remus. 

Sirius is still hung up on Remus wearing his underwear, face flushed.

 _Sorry, Mr. Potter_ , he thinks as he drops his jacket and trousers to the floor in a crumpled heap. His shirt and socks follow, and then in the same drawer Remus has left ajar he finds himself a dry pair of pants. Though aiming for subtlety when he throws a cursory glance in Remus’ direction, he’s caught. Instantly. Remus smiles at him faintly, arms linked loosely around his knees. Sirius thinks an invisible halo might hover somewhere above his head. “Would you like it if I looked away?” Remus asks playfully, but Sirius thinks he might mean it, too.

Sirius breathes a moment. Then, “No,” he decides after a beat. Remus tilts his chin in a nod and lays his head against the heater.

Sirius drops his pants and steps into the clean, dry pair. And, without meeting Remus’ eyes, he goes over and sits beside him, bare back against the slowly-warming heater.

His eyes close as Remus’ fingers loosen his towel turban. “It’ll never dry if you keep it like that,” Remus says softly, tossing the towel so it looks at home amongst Sirius’ strewn clothes. His hair, mostly dry anyway, falls into his face. Remus tucks some behind his ear. As he retracts his hand, Sirius’ eyes follow it until he’s looking openly at Remus. His hair’s dried, too. What was once his lightning bolt looks like nothing more than sunburn on his cheek, and the red’s stained the towel around Remus’ neck.

“You make me nervous,” Sirius says in one exhale. He isn’t sure if the heater’s now on full blast or if the heat crawling up his back is his own.

The furrow to Remus’ brows is tender. His mouth is soft and slack with unformed words. Sirius looks at the red pants again, _his_ red pants, breathes in and doesn’t breathe out, not for a while.

He pushes himself closer along the floor, not subtly. Remus’ legs are criss-crossed so when he gets close enough he feels the dull dig of Remus’ kneecap into his thigh. The wiry, light hair on Remus’ leg makes his chest clench, perhaps because when he walks his fingers from Remus’ thigh toward the crease of his hip it doesn’t feel like it did when he’d slid his palm up underneath Dorcas’ skirt. Remus makes a quiet noise that’s a kind of half-laugh and Sirius lets out his held breath as Remus’ warm hand lays over the back of his neck, pressing down between his shoulder blades and then back up his neck, curling sure, strong fingers into his hair.

And then Sirius flattens his palm onto Remus’ thigh and squeezes and Remus tilts his head backwards with the grasp on his hair so Sirius knows it’s coming when he’s kissed. Their lips smack gently with the separation and Sirius is _nervous_ and Remus knows he is, knows because he bloody told him, but still he’s possessed to fumble onto his knees so he can loom over Remus and lay hands to the chest he daren’t look at not ten minutes ago. Remus holds his face like he’s something precious but not something breakable, and they’re both breathing so, so fast in between the moments that Sirius licks into Remus’ mouth and Remus presses on the small of his back to get Sirius clumsily sat in his lap.

Then Remus breathes out, "You have a bed."

"Yeah." He feels at the firm muscles of Remus' shoulders.

"We should get in it." 

He's right, he's totally right.

"Oh, yeah." 

Sirius' thighs ache as he rolls from his knees to his feet, rises slowly, only releasing Remus when he absolutely must. Remus uses the heater to clamber onto his feet, then nudges past Sirius as if he's not even there. Sirius revolves on the axis Remus bumps him in, tousles his hair from his eyes. Remus' towel is left in a lump on the floor.

Remus lifts the heavy blanket and rolls underneath it, muttering, "Cold, cold, cold." 

Sirius stands off to the side, just watching, cracking his knuckles finger by finger. His whole corpus hums with nerves and want and the chill of a loss of contact. 

"Aren't you joining me?" Remus asks then, with his head on Sirius' pillow, his lips in that tilted smile, and the blanket lifted. Sirius breathes in, out, then crawls onto the mattress on his knees. He doesn't have time to settle before Remus gets him by the wrist and tugs and ensconces him in body heat, landing with his head on the other end of the pillow. It's been less than a minute since Sirius sat in Remus' lap and ran hands over his body and still it feels so new and nerve-wracking to do it all over again as Remus lets the covers drop and draws Sirius in with a sprawled hand on his shoulder blade.

Sirius' giddy smile fades as he looks. Just looks. Remus' eyes are pitch black when cast in shadow. His chin, when Sirius presses his thumb in, feels like Remus has probably shaved that morning, like the stubble's coming back in. And his lips are pliant and pink and _god_ , Sirius knows how they feel against his own, it's a memory he knows and owns by right.

"What is it?" Remus whispers, as if something might be wrong.

Sirius' mouth twitches inevitably. His thumb brushes down Remus' chin to beneath as his fingers skim the side of his neck. "What's what?"

Remus blinks. The tips of his eyelashes are blond. "You're quiet."

Sirius cracks a grin that time. He tentatively slides a foot between Remus' calves, nudges his knee betwixt his thighs, curls toes over delicate bumps of ankle bone. "Told you, you make me nervous." His volume's hardly above a breath.

Remus' hand strokes a circle over his back. His smile turns wry. "Yeah, you're definitely nervous right now." He lifts the blanket, peers down between them comically. "Definitely not, like, trying to work me up, or anything."

Sirius wiggles his thigh closer, feeling brave, but more so feeling the shape of Remus through his pants, _Sirius'_ pants. His heart knocks against his rib cage. _I have no fucking idea what I'm doing. Only what feels right._ "Can't it be both?"

Remus' lips part on a shaky breath, and when he lifts his head and lets the blanket settle, the tip of his nose brushes Sirius'. He cups Sirius' cheek again, hikes himself halfway onto his elbow for a height advantage, and then when their lips just graze one another’s, soft and warm, Sirius’ voice cracks in his throat. "I have no fucking idea what I'm doing," he breathes. Wonders if the quiver of his heart is audible in his voice.

Remus' smile is instant. It crinkles the corners of his eyes. "It's okay." Then he kisses him full-on and Sirius’ lips part for his tongue. Sirius tips his chin upward to follow Remus, who moves to loom over him, like he can’t go a breath without kissing him. Remus’ fingers are in his hair, holding his jaw in place, doing everything to keep Sirius down when all he wants is to be up against him, get as close as he can. Sirius keens low in his throat, and it’s as he writhes, desperate and aroused with toes curling into the sheets, that he bends his knee and Remus gasps, open-mouthed. Sirius’ eyelids flutter halfway open. He snakes his hands down to the small of Remus’ back, hesitating at the base of his spine.

Remus wavers, too, he realises when he gets a glimpse of dark iris above him. He brushes his mouth over Sirius’ cheek, a gentle drag of lips and tongue, and tickles the hair of his sideburn when he whispers against his ear, “Y’okay?”

Sirius’ nod is exuberant. Overly. When he turns his head to smile against Remus’ cheek, he less-than accidentally slides his thigh against the hardness between Remus’ legs.

“Fuck,” mutters Remus, sounding as if his teeth are gritted.

“What’s that?” Sirius murmurs, spreading his palm slowly over the swell of Remus’ arse.

Remus strokes a thumb along the shell of Sirius’ ear, knots a finger into the hair behind it. “You said you didn’t know —”

“You must be easy to figure out.”

That time Remus draws back, hand still clinging to Sirius’ hair, and then they’re eye to eye. Sirius’ hand stills — he worries a moment he’s struck a nerve. But Remus shakes his head, slow and then faster, like he’s falling, falling into the same hole Sirius is, and kisses his yielding mouth once, twice, muttering against it the third, “Promise me you’ll tell me to stop, Sirius, or else I never will.” Remus tucks his face back into Sirius’ neck, nose skimming Sirius’ ear. His arse flexes under Sirius’ palm as he ruts down into him. 

_Oh, you’re so hard_ , Sirius thinks, or then says. His jaw goes slack but his fingers dig in with yearning. _I’m so hot, it’s so hot. You’re so hard and so hot._

“I promise,” he utters, and it comes out so drunkenly that Remus chuckles, gruff and low against his neck, and then Sirius adds a weak, “Fuck you,” that only draws from him a louder laugh. Remus grinds on his leg, Sirius slides careful hands down the back of Remus’ pants, doesn’t dare to touch further with more confidence but he does on accident and Remus’ breath goes instantly heavy. Remus then sits up, slings his leg so he’s sat in Sirius’ lap, and _fuck_ he’s hard, Sirius is, but it’s a battle between thinking about that when he’s got Remus to touch and feel and learn.

Remus peers down at him with a faint smile, eyes and dimple shadowed. Sirius can only imagine what he sees from up there; Sirius can’t control his own features, they’re too far gone. _Reverence_ is all he can think. “Can I touch you?” murmurs Remus, and Sirius’ response in a breathless laugh. Remus’ lips quirk and he’s distracted while he traces a hand down Sirius’ sternum, eyes wandering as he asks, “Have you got —” but that’s when he sees the lotion bottle on Sirius’ nightstand and abruptly points and cackles.

Sirius just scoffs, lets his head loll back. “There’s a chance I’m easy to figure out, too,” he says under his breath as his fingertips draw lines from Remus’ hips down to his knees.

Bottle in hand, Remus mutters, “So, I asked you a question,” and Sirius’ head feels heavy, filled with lead, as Remus squirms to shove his pants lower. If Sirius gawks, he can’t blame himself. Tunnel vision, wholly and completely. His mouth dries.

“You did,” he agrees, voice raspy, and licks his lower lip fruitlessly. “Yeah, yes. Yeah.”

Remus’ mouth tugs at the right side and he drags down Sirius’ pants, too. He lotions his hand, wraps fingers around them both. Sirius gropes at the mattress, at Remus’ arse. Just the touch immerses him in black-white television static sensation, his breaths deep and rough as static noise, skin damp to the touch with sweat. A few strands of Remus’ downy hair stick to his forehead. Guilty past glimpses of porn mean Sirius has seen many a pair of cocks shoved together, but now beneath them it’s his own panting stomach and Remus’ hand is rough and teasingly slow and he can _feel_ it, feel it when Remus pulses against him, he can drink in Remus’ whole being: the dark freckles sparsely dotting his chest, the curls of his pubic hair, the gentle swoops of his collarbones as he leans into the one hand pressed to the mattress by Sirius’ head. Sirius shifts so he temple digs into Remus’ bony wrist. Remus jerks them faster. When they lock eyes, Remus moves his hand so he can press his thumb into Sirius’ mouth. Sirius can’t stop running his hand over Remus’ leg, over his rumpled pants and the soft rounds of his arse. Every touch feels… real.

Sirius comes fast, but not much faster than Remus. And his first instinct is to panic; _my spunk is all over him!_ And _myself! Bloody fuck!_ but Remus leans over and kisses him like he likes it and uses Sirius’ discarded towel turban to wipe them clean and pulls his pants back up for him like he’s a toddler or can’t use his own limbs. And Sirius thinks he won’t try to — use his own limbs, that is — until the moment he decides to pull Remus down onto him and knock the wind from his own chest with the full weight of _boy_.

**FRIDAY 00:02**

Sirius’ ear tickles. He shifts, eyes heavy and hard to open, jerking his shoulder up to bat at the tickles like a dog. Then it’s less tickle and more bite and hot, quiet laughter in his ear and Sirius knows it’s not just an escaped feather from his duvet.

His back is uncomfortably sweaty. The steady thrum of the heater tells him it’s still on, but really, Remus must be the culprit, because only when the weight behind him moves, unsticking limbs from Sirius’ own, does he feel any waft of air that isn’t scorching. And yet he doesn’t like this unsticking. He licks his lips, smiles helplessly when Remus kisses behind his ear.

“Why are you kissing me in my sleep?” he whispers. Remus squeezes at his shoulder, runs his touch all the way down to Sirius’ fingertips.

“Are you opposed to it?” He lays his forehead against the knobs at the top of Sirius’ spine.

Sirius smiles to himself. “Well, _no_ , but I’d like to be awake to enjoy it.”

“That… can be arranged.”

“Can it?” When Sirius peeks over his shoulder, Remus is up on his elbow. It’s blue-black dark but Sirius knows the smile he’s being given.

“Yes,” replies Remus evenly, ghosting feather-light fingers over Sirius’ cheekbone.

“Oh, good.” Sirius latches onto Remus’ wrist and hums. “By whom? Would — would you be so kind as to arrange this, Remus?”

“Me?” Remus’ exhale is heavy and amused and tired, and then the dark shape of him spreads across Sirius’ whole line of sight as he lowers himself down, leaves the wet imprint of his lips on Sirius’ forehead. “I’ll arrange it, yeah.” They’re nose to nose as Remus chuckles, nudges Sirius onto his back, aligns the front of his body along Sirius’ side. “Are you awake yet? You need to be awake.”

Sirius scoffs. “Don’t ask stupid questions.”

“Are you sure you’re awake?” Remus is back to cradling his face. His mouth hovers just to the side of Sirius’ ask he speaks in soft words.

Sirius squirms on the mattress, just for a moment. “If I weren’t, I wouldn’t be able to feel _that_.”

Remus is very hard against Sirius’ hip. The thought drives him _mad_ — the thought of Remus laying beside him, thinking about him.

Presumably.

Sirius bites back a grin. “Is this why you woke me up?”

Remus just laughs, shakes his head. The loose tufts of his hair brush Sirius’ forehead. “It’s okay.”

Sirius snorts. “What’s okay? What does that even _mean_ , ‘it’s okay’?”

“I can live with it.” Then Remus kisses him on the mouth. Sirius tries to murmur against his lips, “Not forever, you can’t,” but the way Remus kisses him isn’t just a kiss and Sirius’ mind is wiped by the hungry way he drags Sirius into him by his back and his bum.

They kick the blanket off, skin to skin. Sirius feels his eyes cross as he draws away from Remus an inch, hands clammy against Remus’ chest. “It’s too fucking hot,” he whispers, brushing together the tips of their noses.

Remus sounds complacent as he strokes Sirius’ hair from his face. “I’m not getting up.”

“I’m sweating,” whispers Sirius pleadingly, squeezing Remus’ chin between his fingers. “It’s not very cinematic.” When Remus chuckles, Sirius quirks his brows smilingly. “Are we not still in your big production?”

“Small production,” says Remus. “Low budget. Just enough to buy filming equipment and… quirky clothes.”

Sirius’ laugh is a soft huff. “Essentials.” His eyes close, head droops against the pillow, fingers trace absently over the bones of Remus’ chest. “There are too many films,” he whispers.

“Whatever do you mean?” Remus’ tone is soft. His tugs a bit on Sirius’ hair, detangling a knot.

“Too many possibilities.” Sirius peeks open an eye. “In one film, we’re us, but in — _Norway_. In another we could be in France. Another in Spain. In another, I have a happy family. The _happiest_. I have the kind of mum who puts notes about how much she loves me in the lunches she packs me, cuts the crusts off my sandwiches. And in another… we’re us, but we meet on _Love Island_.” Remus’ laugh is surprised and rough and wonderful. Sirius smirks. “And obviously we walk away with the prize. Oh, and then there’s another where we meet on Bakeoff. We both make it to the final. You’re a fan favorite and your smile is Mary Berry’s weakness, but time after time, my bakes are sublime, words of Paul Hollywood himself.”

Remus shakes his head. “Those aren’t _films_ , Sirius —”

Sirius hums snidely. “You’re just jealous because your bottoms are always soggy.”

“Oh my god.”

“And because I win.”

“They can’t all be happy, Sirius. What if in one, we meet once in passing and then never again, because I die before fate can bring us together?”

Sirius blinks against the blanket of the dark. His hand curves to fit the side of Remus’ neck. “Don’t say things like that.”

“Why?” He hears rather than sees Remus swallow. His tone remains oddly casual. “You’ve never thought about it?”

If Remus means what Sirius thinks he means — “No?”

“Never?” Fingers sift through Sirius’ hair. “Never thought about dying — just, up and dying to spite everyone?”

Sirius’ brow creases. “I… I actually think living’s more spiteful.” His eyes flicker over the shapeless silhouette of Remus. His fingertips are insistent as they dig into the muscle at the junction of Remus’ shoulder and neck. “I don’t like talking about — this.”

“Okay,” Remus assents. He covers Sirius’ hand with his own. His fingers prise off Sirius’ grip, then, in favor of threading their fingers together. Sirius’ arm is asleep beneath him, and it pricks and aches but he wants to kiss Remus, and he wants to touch Remus’ face while he kisses him. He wants.

And he _gets_ when he lifts his head from the pillow with a sort of slowness that begets expectation, squeezing tight at Remus’ hand and pinning their adjoined palms to the mattress behind Remus. This forces Remus to give and roll backward, grunt softly and circle his arm around Sirius’ waist. He finds Remus’ mouth because he can hear and feel him breathing, and it’s like plunging underwater because Sirius doesn’t come up for air for what feels like hours, or come up for reality, for that matter; anything beyond his bedroom is beyond the scope of his mind.

Kissing Remus is searching, peering through the warm fog of a mist when he doesn’t know what he’s looking for. Sirius lets himself get wrapped up in it, in the slide of Remus’ tongue, the press of Remus’ nose to his cheek, the way Remus’ hands find their way to his face one way or the other.

But then Sirius sucks in a breath, his lips wet and tender, their foreheads touching, and Remus says, “And who was the one with the soggy bottom when I turned on the sprinklers?”

Sirius tells him to _please fuck off, maybe forever_ , but when Remus gets up he doesn’t really leave, he only turns off the heater.

**SATURDAY 3:15**

A distant thud jars Sirius awake. The duvet is drawn to his chin against the cool air of his room, and he realises, sitting up, that the slept-on space beside him is empty but for a faded neon sticky note he barely notices in the dark. He nabs it, rubs tiredly at one eye as he brings it closer. Of course it’s in code. He groans quietly, sits up with a heaviness to his limbs. The towels they’d used are folded and set neatly on Sirius’ desk chair. Remus’ scattered clothes are gone.

Then the door to his room opens, flooding his vision with a stripe of golden yellow light from the hall. Sirius squints and shields his eyes at the intrusion simultaneously as Lily, bag and Poison Ivy unitard dangling from her elbow and heeled shoes from her crooked fingers, says with loud stupefaction, “Shit! Shit, sorry!”

Sirius hastily swipes the covers up higher, but he lowers them as belated realisation unfolds on his face. “Oh. Oh, dammit.” He rubs a hand over his face. “I — I forgot. Totally forgot about our… swap.”

Lily lowers the shoes she’d been hiding behind, peers into the room again. “Oh, you’re alone,” she mutters, entering then and bumping the door closed with her hip. She dumps her belongings on the towels on Sirius’ chair, shouldering out of her coat.

Sirius watches her warily. She moves without her usual stolid grace, at present more akin to a lumbering ogre. “Are you drunk?”

“Yes.” Lily rolls her argyle stockings down her legs. Sirius has one foot off the bed. “I am. I’ve just had a very long chat with my very infuriating ex-boyfriend, and I’m balls tired, which is why —” She drops her skirt, performs a mysterious maneuver to remove her bra from beneath her shirt, and steps over to the bed. “Why I’m not booting you from the bed.” She only stands for a moment, though, eyeing the spot beside Sirius. “Now, clearly whoever slept here is gone,” she says analytically. Sirius raises a surly eyebrow, but tucks his foot back under the duvet. Then Lily seems to rethink and crawl onto the bed despite herself. “Never mind. I don’t want to know what heinous things you did on the sheets I changed two days ago.”

Sirius remains upright, biting hard on his lower lip. Lily curls up with her back to him, needing no pillow, and falls silent. He attempts to cover her with the duvet but she shoves it away insistently.

Sirius retreats to his side of the bed. With the duvet bunched around him, he fumbles for his phone to pull up the secret alphabet.

_Did u know u talk in ur sleep?_

And a bit lower:

_It’s cute. :)_

**SATURDAY 11:20**

Lily is dead asleep beside Sirius. In the hour before she wakes, he doesn’t dare move, as if jostling the bed might mean prodding a sleeping bear. He’s fine staring at the ceiling anyway, Remus’ sticky note crumpled between his fingers and pressed to his chest. He thinks the smile won’t leave his face anytime soon, and just when he thinks he might be done, his face warms over with an inexorable flush and he has to press his face to the cool side of the pillow and take in a breath before he goes faint.

Lily groans into consciousness, gets up startlingly fast. She spares Sirius not a look, marches to the corner of the room where she’s left a duffel full of her clothes, and pulls on joggers. Sirius is still in bed when she promptly untucks the fitted sheet and attempts to wrestle it off the mattress, his weight withstanding.

“What are you doing?” he blurts, voice rough with disuse. He lurches off the bed when Lily gives an aggressive tug.

“Laundry.”

Sirius clambers to his feet, hands hovering uselessly before him. _Should I help?_ “Do you want, like, a paracetamol, or —”

“I just want to do laundry, Sirius.”

The door flies open on its hinges and Gil assumes a lounging position in the doorframe, cup of tea steaming between his hands. He regards them silently, looking from Lily’s bedhead to Sirius’, down to Sirius’ state of nakedness, and raises his eyebrows. “Well, this is unexpected. Open a window, would you, Sirius? I can _smell_ that you’ve been a busy man these past twelve hours.”

Sirius balks, folds arms over his bare chest. “I, I — _what?!_ ”

Lily chuckles humorlessly, stripping the duvet of its cover. “It could be my last day on this planet and I wouldn’t shag Sirius.”

Gil snickers, and when Sirius doesn’t move, he goes, draws the curtains and throws open the window himself. “Your friend Remus is nice, though,” he remarks, and only then does Lily let up with the sheets. Sirius’ eyes flit to him.

“What?” Sirius croaks, biting his thumbnail.

“Remus was here?” Lily watches Sirius, not Gil. Then glances suspiciously at the sheets clenched in her hands.

“Yeah, I came in around two last night? He was leaving. Nice bloke. Good hair.” Gil leans into the windowsill, blows carefully on his tea.

“Er,” Sirius says so Lily can’t get a word in edgewise, though his mind is ruefully blank, “er… Yeah. We were at Benjy’s party and, and he was totally wasted, was gonna try to ride his bike back home like that so, I, er. Let him crash here.” He bites concentratedly at his upper lip, eyes cast down to the floor. Then he remembers Lily was at Benjy’s party but only hopes she won’t comment.

Gil nods in his peripheral vision. “Alright,” he says, seemingly uncaring. “I think you could’ve both fit on the sofa, though. It’s convertible, y’know? So —”

Sirius shakes his head quickly. “It’s fine. I won’t have him over again if it breaks something in the bloody flatshare contract that, by the way, I _don’t_ even remember signing —”

“Sirius,” Gil interjects with a snort. “You can _have guests over_. Vernon’s here every now and then to see Tuney, and god knows I’ve a hefty backlog of visitors.” Gil’s eyes narrow peculiarly. “I just meant you and Remus could fit easily on the sofa next time and leave the bedroom to Lily.”

Sirius fishmouths, panic tensing his body from temple to toe, and then insists with waning vehemence, “There is no _me and Remus,_ Gil. I let him stay over out of — out of generosity…”

Gil fiddles with the string on his teabag, lips pursed, nodding slowly. He and Lily exchange a look that has Sirius bristling. “Okay,” Gil drawls finally. “I… am going to fry up sausages. Lily, would you like a sausage?”

Lily, clearing her throat and still evaluating Sirius like he’s written in a different language, says, “Two, please.”

“Alright.” Gil stops by Sirius. “Would you like a sausage, Sirius?”

Brow in a furrow, Sirius’ eyes flicker to Gil and he shakes his head minutely.

“Right on.” Gil claps him on the shoulder and slips out.

Lily gathers the sheets in a bundle against her chest. She smiles sagely at Sirius, and in padding toward the door, hesitates at his side. “You have something…” she says, gesturing vaguely to his neck, then leaves the bedroom.

Once she’s disappeared, Sirius rushes to the mirror on the desk. In the glow of the late morning light, the smear of pinkish-red on his neck is too garish to be a slap or a bruise. He swipes his fingertip along his jaw and it comes away red.

**MONDAY 10:32**

Sirius scoots to the side of the hallway to unzip his rucksack and check his Computer Science folder is where it should be. His bag is left gaping when he lifts his eyes, ears catching a raucous chorus of familiar voices down the hall. James, Benjy, and Peter stroll together in an impassable row, redirecting the flow of (admittedly annoyed) between-classes traffic down the corridor to its edges. They’re so entrenched in their natter that Sirius thinks they’ll pass him without notice, so he calls out, “Oi!”

They skid to a stop by Sirius. Peter smiles at the sight of him, but Benjy’s face falters. James is almost… distant.

“Hey,” Sirius greets, shrugging arms under rucksack straps. “How was — er, weekends? Your weekends? What’d you do?”

As if it’s the question Peter had been needing Sirius to ask, he explodes giddily, “ _Benjy_ certainly had an eventful weekend.” His eyes roll to Benjy, who perks up, puffing his chest and biting the tip of his tongue. Then he shrugs nonchalantly.

“Yeah?” presses Sirius. It’s shockingly difficult to sound genuine when James won’t look at him.

“Yup,” confirms Benjy, rubbing together his palms, resting them against the tip of his nose as if in prayer. “ _Mary Macdonald_ … _choked_ on a Hobnob at the party.” _The party._ Sirius’ blood drains from his face, drips down to his toes. “And I, being a registered EMT, the _only_ registered EMT present, happened to be the most qualified to perform the Heimlich maneuver on ‘er.” Benjy’s eyebrows lift smugly and he spreads his arms. “So… I basically saved her life.”

“It was after you left,” says James, supplying an unnecessary reminder to Benjy, whose smile wavers.

Sirius sighs, sags backward into the wall. “Yeah, sorry about that. My mum kept calling, wouldn’t stop badgering me about, er… I had to step out. Sounds like you did well enough for yourself, though.”

Benjy nods with vigour, turning toward Peter and James. “When she spat out that bit of Hobnob — d’you remember?”

“ _Of course_ James remembers, it hit his glasses,” Peter chimes in, cheeks rounded by his smile.

James buries his face in his hands. “Christ.”

Peter shoves James along further along the hall — their classes are in a different wing of the school to Sirius’ — and Benjy follows, his voice drifting into the noise of the thickening masses around them. “That’s not what — _no_ , I meant, do you _remember_ that after she spat out the Hobnob, she didn’t let go of me for ten whole minutes —!” Sirius, in a strange state of detachment, makes his way to the Computer Science classroom.

His eyes glaze over during the lecture. Every now and then he’ll look over at the sound of Amaline’s vicious pen-scraping in her notebook, then regard his empty page, the pen tucked between his fingers, and return to waiting for the teacher to lift his arms in a nonsensical gesture and reveal the sweat stains at his armpits.

Mr. Perry is so entrenched in describing the landscape of CPU architecture that in no way would he notice Remus at the door of the classroom. Sirius only does because the teacher’s gone out of focus in his vision and behind him, Remus in the square window on the door is not as easy to zone out on. Remus observes the teacher’s flailing like he’s appreciatively watching monkeys eat lice off one another in a zoo, and with the same cool expression, he looks Sirius’ way. Sirius’ jaw is ajar, eyes quizzical, and Remus only smiles with crinkly crow’s feet and looks down. Sirius’ phone buzzes.

**_Remus: This is fascinating._ **

**_Remus: I would understand not wanting to skip class… given that this is so fascinating._ **

Sirius bites his lip. When he rises loudly from his chair, bumping it against the table behind, Amaline startles. Sirius points at the door, whisper-yelling _toilet!_ both for Amaline and Mr. Perry’s sake.

As Sirius closes the classroom door behind him, Remus seems to bounce on his toes. He moves out of the way of the window, opening his mouth to ask, “Why are you here? Don’t you have cla —” but Remus seizes him by the cheeks and presses a firm, open-mouthed kiss to his lips. Sirius clutches onto Remus’ arms in shock, seeking balance, but the corridor is blissfully empty enough that tumbleweed rolling past wouldn’t seem out of place. Then Remus takes his hand, proceeds to tug him down the corridor.

“Come on, I want to show you something.”

Sirius, head whipping to peer over his shoulder periodically, complies, right up until they reach a door leading outside that Remus shoulders open.

Sirius skids to a stop, still inside school. “Where are we going?”

Remus smiles at him curiously, stepping back inside. His free hand remains on the door. “Out.”

Sirius chuckles reluctantly, peering down the hall. He toys with the tight front pocket on his jeans. “I can’t just leave. I have the rest of Comp Sci, and then Robotics later, I have to…” Remus’ bright eyes don’t dim, but he does drop his hand from the door and arch an eyebrow at Sirius, in particular when Sirius asks, “Don’t you have class?”

“Well, we can’t have you missing your robots,” Remus replies discursively. “Without your help, how else will they overcome the intelligence of the human race?”

Sirius snorts and looks away, but Remus backs him into the closest wall, thumbing over the divot in Sirius’ chin.

“Anyhow,” mutters Remus. “I just wanted to see you.” Sirius’ swallow is audible, like a faint croak between them, and Remus’ lips quirk. “I told Ros what happened between us.”

Sirius’ face, still overall blank in the confused stupor of Remus seeking him out, kissing him in school and nearly dragging him out of it, goes pale. “What?”

Remus nods. “And we’re not together anymore.”

“Oh.”

“Which means I can do this —” Remus hums as he lowers his head, kissing the spot where his thumb had been. “— And this —” He smiles against Sirius’ mouth, teeth scraping softly over his bottom lip. “— Without guilt.”

When Sirius sucks in a breath, he’s inhaling Remus, and he wishes he wasn’t because it’s dizzying and he’s looking to feel grounded more than anything. “Uh.” He turns his head away a degree. “You’re not upset?”

Remus’ nose brushes his cheek. “Do I seem upset?”

Sirius tries not to smile, because it wouldn’t quite reflect how he feels, the roiling inside his chest and deep, deep in the pit of his stomach. Still he does because Remus’ fingers are twined between his and even from so close, he can tell there’s something warm and true dancing in the blur of Remus’ brown irises.

Remus tips his head away, but he doesn’t stop scanning Sirius’ face. His thumb draws a circle onto Sirius’ wrist. “So I thought now that I’ve told Ros, you might want to…” He shrugs one shoulder. “Tell your friends, your family. Whoever.”

Sirius almost laughs because he hadn’t thought he’d tell his friends anything. Not anytime soon, not ever. And his _family?_ That’s when he does laugh. Something flickers noticeably on Remus’ face. “I’m not on the best terms with my family,” he says, but he squeezes Remus’ hand to let him know he’s not being brushed off.

“I was going to ask about that.” Remus leans into a hand he props up by Sirius’ head. “‘Cos of what you said on Friday about your…” Remus smiles faintly. “Alternate universes.”

Sirius cringes internally. He does vaguely recall bitching about his mother in a way he might’ve thought would go under Remus’ radar. “There’s not much to say.”

“Okay.” Remus is unflinching. “You don’t live with them, is all I gathered —”

“They’re fucking mad, that’s why,” Sirius says, voice burning his throat. There’s a poster on the opposite wall advertising mental health awareness. Sirius’ nostrils flare. “That’s why I don’t live with them.”

Remus breathes. Then, “Mad how?”

“It’s my mum, mostly.” Sirius rubs at the bridge of his nose. “She’s batshit crazy. Out in public she’s fine, but the second we get home, her mood swings like fucking Satan possesses her and she takes it all out —” _Remus isn’t a therapist_. Sirius seeks out his gaze, shrugs. “It’s fine. I don’t talk to her unless I need to, which isn’t often.”

Remus nods. “Oh.”

Sirius smiles dryly. “I don’t care what she thinks anyway.” The hollow silence of the corridor is calming, imbues him with enough courage to touch Remus’ chest, tilt his chin up toward him. “What did you want to show me? Where?”

Remus smiles after a beat, sets his forefinger against Sirius’ lips. “Some other time.” He unhands Sirius, curls his fingers around the straps of his bag. “You have the rest of Comp Sci. And Robotics later.” And then Remus is gone through the door beside them. Sirius pushes off the wall, watches the gap between the door and the jamb as Remus lopes across the deserted schoolyard and hikes his hood over his head.

**WEDNESDAY 17:09**

Sirius hasn’t seen Remus since he walked out of school on Monday morning. Not that it’s abnormal for him to go a few days without seeing Remus; perhaps their paths in school just don’t cross. Or perhaps Remus isn’t in school to _be_ crossed, off at his _somethings some other times_. 

Sirius still has his friends, with whom he’d tentatively taken a seat during lunch on Monday and for some reason he’d expected to turn him away. But Benjy had nodded and James had made room for him and Peter had shoved at Sirius a yogurt in his least favorite flavour that his mother always packs him, knowing Sirius wouldn’t let it go to waste, flavour notwithstanding.

Sirius ought to feel lucky his friends keep him around, though he can tell James can see the storm cloud hovering perpetually over Sirius’ head. He may not understand the cause of it — Sirius thinks back to Remus saying _tell your friends_ and snorts — but he knows it’s there and can feel the spray of the rain when he stands in Sirius’ splash zone. _Tell your friends_. Sirius tucks his legs beneath him, head against the wall. He’s in his ‘room’ — _on the sofa_ — Maths homework spread across the cushions and the coffee table, listening to Gil putter about in the kitchen. It’s bizarre enough that Gil is _puttering_. He doesn’t cook much, usually only buys prepared foods… or eats Sirius’ prepared foods. Sirius takes one last gander at the Greek symbols littering the page of the textbook before shutting it and heading to the kitchen.

Gil looks at Sirius when he enters, then back at his phone screen, brow scrunched. “At what temperature is it safest to cook a cauliflower-crust pizza?”

Sirius puts his hands in his joggers pockets. “No fucking clue.”

“You’re no help.”

Sirius peers at the mess Gil’s made on the baking tray. “What _is_ that?”

Gil locks his phone and sighs, nudging a myriad of opened tin cans out of his way so he can sit on the counter. “Petunia’s pizza crust that claims to be made from cauliflower, blue cheese leftover from the salad I had for lunch, and I, er… I didn’t have tomato sauce, so I took this canned ravioli —”

“My canned ravioli,” Sirius supplies blankly.

“— and used the sauce in there. There wasn’t much, so I used three.” He nods at the cans behind him, and Sirius pictures his poor, cold, naked ravioli. _Three cans’ worth_.

 _Tell your friends._ Instead of fuming, Sirius ruminates on the hideous pizza, then asks, “Can I talk to you about something?”

Gil has his phone out again. “Says it burns easily,” he muses. “Of course it does, you’re substituting bread with a bloody vegetable, Karen.” Then he rests the screen against his cheek, turning a vacant gaze on Sirius. “If you’re going to warn me you’ll be late on next month’s rent _before_ it’s due this time, you don’t need to. I’ve come to expect it, Sirius.” Sirius doesn’t know what, but something must play across his face, because before he can fully turn to leave, Gil says, “Wait — _wait_. Sorry. Bad joke. _Terrible_. What is it?” and it’s so unlike Gil to say that to _Sirius_ , words sounding foreign in his mouth. And Sirius is already treading on flaming glass. He needs for his face to control itself before he’s out of all his secrets.

Sirius lays his hand against the back of the nearest chair, drumming fingertips against it. He looks closely at the corner no one cleans, black with dust, difficult for their shoddy broom to reach. “So.” _Strong start._ He rubs his index and forefingers into his eyes. “So I think Remus and I are hooking up.”

He finds Gil looking at him with an expression almost neutral. “Yeah?”

Sirius nods.

“Hm.” Gil reaches over to adjust the temperature on the oven, pick up the baking sheet. “I’m happy for you, Sirius. He’s cute.” He slides the sheet into the oven; Sirius feels a latent curl of its heat against his cheek. “ _Great_ hair, though I think I’ve said that already.”

Sirius holds his breath for as long as he can manage. It’s why his voice comes out so strained and unsteady when he finally speaks again. “Are you surprised? Or unsurprised?”

Gil squats before the oven, peering warily through its window. “Sirius, I don’t really think about who you’re getting with.” Then he smiles up Sirius from the floor. “Except for the lack thereof.”

Sirius snorts, pulls out the chair and sits down. “Right.”

Gil’s blonde curls bounce as he nods. “Yep. Did you want advice? Like, first-time-with-dick advice? Because let me tell you now, Sirius, Google isn’t nearly —”

“I’m not gay, or anything like that.”

Gil’s cut off, jaw hanging. It takes him a moment, but he then frowns thoughtfully. “Okay.”

“I’m not.”

Gil laughs, just short of incredulous. “Yeah, I hear you, Sirius.”

“Why do you sound like you’re taking the piss?” Sirius, with his eyebrows in a furrow, can’t look away from his hands. He’s picked his cuticle down to blood, has to lick it away so it doesn’t smear on the jeans he’d rather not wash for another few days.

Gil pouts. “Sorry. I think it’s my natural tone. I believe you, though. The only person who has the last word on what you are is you.”

Sirius sucks on the inside of his cheek until it tastes raw. “Yeah, ‘cos… I don’t want you thinking that, like, just because I like a bloke for once, I’m going to…” He shrugs, shakes his head. “Start wearing sparkly makeup and spandex hotpants out of the house or working the gory details of my nightly _Grindr_ hookups into every conversation.” Gil says nothing, so Sirius plows onward. “Like, I’m not suddenly gonna be all up in everyone’s faces like that. _This_ — me, me liking Remus — doesn’t change how I act or how I look or anything.”

Gil clears his throat. “You don’t want me thinking that,” he echoes.

Sirius looks at him. “I mean — I don’t want _anyone_ thinking that.”

Gil checks on his pizza once more, then straightens up. He sets the oven timer, drums his fingertips against the counter, then swivels to look at Sirius. The edge to his eyes verges on glacial as he lifts his hands to his sides, lets them slap against his legs when they fall. “Why would I think that, Sirius?”

Sirius shrugs again, shaking his head wildly now. “I don’t know, because — because you act like you came out of the womb waving a rainbow flag.”

Gil blinks, rubs a hand over the lower half of his face, and says, “I don’t _act_ like anything, Sirius. I just _am_. I just am the way I am.” He pauses. “Because I enjoy how it feels to be myself, for all the downsides that sometimes means.”

“Yeah, and that’s brilliant,” Sirius says, smiling tightly. “And it’s so important that you are, mate, but I can’t do it.”

“Do what?”

Sirius eyes widen. It seems obvious enough to him. “Fully embrace, like. The gay thing,” he says blankly. “Snogging boys in public. Going to — I don’t know. Gay clubs or… or Pride.”

Gil laughs, dry and bitter. “Sirius, there’s no _handbook on being gay_ that says that in order to be gay, you have to wear makeup or dress the way I do or _embrace_ the full package… whatever that means. But do you know what I think of them? The people who do, y’know, party at Pride or hold their partners’ hands in the street?” Gil’s tone grows hoarser with anger and something more tender. “I think they’re fucking brave as fuck. It’s not safe for everyone to come out, and still some do, and — do you know how much shit they get for it, Sirius? How much shit they have to deal with for just wanting to be themselves out where everyone can see? How much violence and hatred? They’d rather die than not have that. And some do.” Gil’s lips go pale as he purses them, and then he says, voice unwavering, “And it’s shit like what you just said, Sirius, that stereotypes us and ridicules us and perpetuates that shame that half the world is still trying to force on us.”

A conflicting sensation of hot-cold prickles at Sirius’ scalp, at the top of his spine. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Yes, it was.” Gil sighs like he’s exhaling all the air from his lungs and leans his hip into the counter. They both watch the seconds tick by on the oven timer. “I can’t leave the kitchen because of _this_ ,” Gil murmurs then, flapping his hand at the oven, “but I don’t want to talk to you anymore, so I’d appreciate it if you left.”

Sirius doesn’t have physical walls to hide behind. The living room lies in silence composed of the humming cars passing outside and the rustle of sheets as Sirius makes his bed for the evening. It’s only just gone six and still, once he has a sheet on the mattress, he strips and squirms underneath his blanket, Maths homework dumped on the floor and forgotten. At the faint buzz of his phone, still shoved deep into his jeans pocket, Sirius clenches his eyes closed tighter, and two minutes later inevitably rolls over, cocooned in his blanket, to fish it from the floor. It’s only Peter yammering in the group chat — _why always in the group chat_ — begging to know James’ take on their last English assignment.

He opens his messages with Remus. He reads and rereads the most recent, sent when Remus ambushed him in Comp Sci. Then his thumbs tap across the keyboard, slow and disembodied. The screen is too bright. He’s turned off all the living room lights and the sun, creeping down the sky, filters in only between the gap Sirius lazily left between the blackout curtains.

**_Sirius: i told my flatmate. just about the closest thing I have to family_ **

which isn’t entirely the truth. James is miles closer, and yet Sirius can’t stomach that thought.

He hasn’t even locked the screen yet when it shows that Remus has read his message. He thumbs a speck of dust away, accidentally types an _m_ that he deletes, eyes bleary but aware of the ellipsis that tells him Remus is typing.

**_Remus: Hey. I don’t think I could be worse with this timing, but I think this might be moving a little too fast for me. My fault entirely that we started out on a sprint. I’m sorry. Need some time. x_ **

Sirius wishes he hadn’t read it at all, or at least hadn’t read it live for Remus to see that he can’t possibly wring a response out of his limp rag of a heart right then. He shoves his phone off the bed and hears the almost-defeaning clatter of it against the thick silence drenching the living room and turns his face into his pillow and screams. His overgrown nails cut into his palms as he clenches his fists.

Fuck Wednesdays.

**FRIDAY 20:55**

It was years ago that Sirius was outlawed from playing _Super Smash Bros_. _Brawl_ against anyone — neither Peter, James, nor Benjy — but their enemies. On rare occasions, the lads allow him a round if he swears to only have one hand on the controller at any given time. James once went so far as to tie Sirius’ right hand to the leg of the couch with one of Euphemia’s shawls to ensure he didn’t bend his specialised rules.

It used to bloat his ego, the fact his friends wouldn’t let him play because he’d annihilate them within the first few minutes of any round no matter the character he played, but now, laying sprawled across the overstuffed armchair in James’ living room, the other lads on the sofa, hollering and shoving one another and tinkering frantically with their controllers, Sirius derives no satisfaction from his superiority. His phone burns a hole in his pocket, Remus’ message surfacing in his thoughts whenever he suspects himself adequately distracted. So he gives up all together trying _not_ to think about it, and actively tries not to think of anything at all. The beer he’s holding tastes foamy and lukewarm in his mouth and he doesn’t feel it in his veins even though all he’s done since he got to James’ over an hour ago is drink. He swishes it around in the can, and then James cries out sharply — Peter’s Kirby has just spat James’ Yoshi offstage to his death — and Sirius sloshes the beer onto the jeans he hadn’t been intending on washing that week. He sets the can down, wrinkles his nose in distaste at the spot soaking through the fabric and onto his skin, and slings his arm across his eyes.

“Not all may be lost,” James says, throwing down his controller. It takes both Peter and Benjy, too invested in attacking one another, a ten second delay to acknowledge James.

“What do you mean? There’s no take-backs in Smash, and I would never take back kicking your arse — _no!_ ” Peter howls. Kirby is nowhere to be seen, Meta Knight stands unharmed and victorious on the platform. Sirius smiles absently as he peeks from beneath his arm to watch Benjy perform a silent dance of victory complete with overly exuberant fist pumps.

“I _mean_ that I just got a text from Esme Fraser —”

“Isn’t she year eleven?” mutters Peter.

Sirius drops his arm from his face. “Why are you texting year elevens?”

“She’s sixteen, calm your jubblies.” James kicks up his feet onto the ottoman. “And she’s just texted me her address. Says we can come to her party, if we want.”

Benjy tosses aside the spotlight of his win spectacularly fast, slamming down his controller and stating, “Free booze.”

James’ phone chimes. Sirius watches the glare of the television screen on his glasses as he checks it and snorts. “Oh, you’ll love this, Ben. She thinks we’re friends with Evans ‘cos Sirius hangs with her and Amaline all the time, so she took the liberty of informing me that _Evans and her pals_ are there.” He drops his phone to his lap, sighs wistfully. “She wants me.”

“I don’t _hang_ with Lily,” scoffs Sirius, but he’s overshadowed by Peter when he laughs and says, “She must. Everyone knows Evans is Potter-bait.”

Benjy is already putting on his coat. “Why isn’t anyone else moving?” he asks, sounding preoccupied as he pats his pockets for his phone. “Evans and her _pals_. The likelihood that Mary’ll be there is statistically significant.”

Peter and James exchange a glance, then respectively turn off the TV and Xbox. James plucks Sirius’ leather jacket from the back of the sofa and throws it at him. Sirius groans beneath the blackness.

“I don’t know what’s got you in this funk, mate, but you’re coming,” James says assertively, voice wobbling while, Sirius suspects, he stumbles into his shoes without unlacing them.

“Did Dorcas crush your itty bitty heart?” Benjy asks, swiping the jacket off Sirius’ head and rubbing the top of his hair. Sirius glowers as he sorts out the tangles.

“Tread carefully, Ben, what if she did?” hisses Peter, and Sirius rolls his eyes.

“She didn’t _break my heart,_ ” he says, loud and frank. “And I don’t... I’m not in the mood for this. For _Esme Fraser’s_ party.” Even her name tastes sour in his mouth.

“To be fair, she keeps bragging about all the year twelves at the party, so it’s not gonna be, like, all lower schoolers,” says James, eyes on his phone, and then Benjy pitches in, squatting beside Sirius with a sort of urgency to his voice. “Mate. _Mate_. You left my fucking _birthday_ party, you _have_ to come now. You basically owe it to me.”

And so Sirius shrugs into his jacket and chokes down the rest of that beer he’d spilled on himself. On the Tube, while James stands hands-free as if he doesn’t need support when the metro comes screeching to a stop every few minutes, while Benjy stares with undisguised curiosity at a pair of drag queens in platformed heels, Sirius finally remembers why he doesn’t like the name _Fraser._

**FRIDAY 21:42**

As the light drizzle outside grows less light, Sirius walks with his jacket tugged up over his head as most leather jackets don’t come with hoods. James has his hood up and red hoodie strings tied so tight it’s a wonder his glasses don’t pop out from the opening of his hood, Peter had come prepared with a rain jacket because he checks the weather, and Benjy forgets he has a hood. Then James tells Sirius he looks like Quasimodo and Sirius tells him he looks like an angry knob and Peter steps between them when their scuffle threatens to have them tumbling off the slippery sidewalk and onto the street.

“The code is one-eight-five-six,” James reads from his phone as they stand in the vestibule of Esme’s building.

“Eighteen fifty-six,” murmurs Peter. “That’s when the Anglo-Persian war started.”

Sirius punches it into the keypad, holding the door like a decent human and letting the other lads past. He doesn’t need to ask which floor the party is on, because the pounding of the bass from within and pile of soaked umbrellas dumped outside door _102_ just up the first flight of stairs is clue enough.

James pounds a fist on the door. When there’s no response, he’s raising his hand to knock again as it suddenly opens… a crack, just enough to fit a person. And that person is Lily, cider in hand, auburn hair tied back from her face. James is so floored that the cajoling smile he means to enact takes a long time coming, and Lily notices, arching a thin eyebrow.

“Nice evening for it, huh, Evans?” says James, and Sirius could openhandedly smack him.

“Mm. Yes, Potter, rainy Friday nights _are_ ideal for binge-drinking to become disturbingly less selective of potential sexual partners, alongside other miscellaneous brain-cell destruction.” She swigs from her bottle. Benjy suppresses a snort and James gawks, somewhere between floundering for a response and replaying _sexualsexualsexual_ in Evans’ voice. It brings to mind year seven French, gradually raising the volume of James’ laptop as they forced the Google Translate Lady to say _bittebittebitte_ on a loop in the middle of class. When Sirius tunes back in, Lily is saying, “Oh, did you want to come in?” as she peers over her shoulder into the flat.

“If you’d rather talk out here all night, I really have no preference,” says James. _Esme Fraser_ , Sirius almost whispers, just to provoke him. Lily blinks at James, her eyes half-lidded either out of boredom or because she’s high, and then the door opens wider as Mary Macdonald shows her face and asks, “Who is it — oh.”

She looks at Benjy, and either she was flushed to begin with or he truly, _genuinely_ has an effect on her.

“Hi,” breathes Benjy, smile spreading.

“Hello,” says Mary, quiet, tucking hair behind her ear.

James smirks, but at Lily.

Peter pulls his phone out of his pocket and leans into the wall.

“For fuck’s sake.” Sirius pushes the door open to slip inside between Mary and the door frame. He weaves between the loud and the flailing and the utterly plastered, moving without a destination other than _where’s a bloody window I could smoke a cigarette?_ But a second thought intrudes as he steps into the kitchen, sees the balcony doors thrown open. _I’m in Remus’ ex-girlfriend’s sister’s flat. Or Remus’ ex-girlfriend’s flat?_ He moves toward the balcony, pulling a cigarette from his pocket. None of the faces around him are familiar and he’s remarkably comfortable with that — that is, until he leans against the balcony railing, shielded from the rain by the balcony just above, and sees, through the throng of people in the kitchen and through the smoke he’s exhaling, Dorcas stride into the kitchen.

“Shit,” he breathes sharply. “Shit, fuck, shit.” He’s officially cornered, Dorcas standing between him and the only exit from the kitchen. He warily eyes the drop from the balcony. _One story_. _Could be worse_. He swiftly turns to lean his elbows on the railing, wishing suddenly he’d worn something from Gil’s closet that was less recognisable, and attempts to be discreet about inching as close to the balcony’s edge as he can get, but there’s no hiding from the door.

“I thought that was you.”

The cigarette breaks in Sirius’ tense grasp. He blows one last plume of smoke before letting it drop from his fingers and follow the rain plummeting to the ground. There Dorcas stands, plastic cup clutched between her fingers, several inches above Sirius’ eye level with the help of her heels. He swallows thickly, curls his fingers around the cold, dirty railing. “It’s me,” he says tentatively. Ineffectually. Dorcas snorts, tapping her foot with restless energy.

“Listen,” Sirius starts, jaw working for a moment as he turns to face her. “I’m sorry. Leaving you at Benjy’s party, that was shitty. So shitty. I’m sorry.”

Dorcas raises her eyebrows, eyes flitting over him from head to toe and then up again. “You think I’m angry about that?” She huffs, shakes her head.

Sirius frowns. “What —”

“I’m _angry_ , Sirius, because of how humiliated I feel. Because you played me for a complete fool. Over and over you apologised and made me promises you couldn’t keep, made me feel good about myself, about _us_ , when —” She glances past his shoulder, lips pursed, then looks him straight in the eye — “When you’re fucking gay.”

Sirius’ throat closes up. He smiles dully, all the warm damp from the rain on his body going cold. “You have no idea what you’re talking about,” he says, quiet and with a faltering voice that Dorcas stampedes over.

“You used me,” she seethes, then laughs faintly. “And I fell for it. All of it. I’m almost as angry with myself as I am with you.” She blinks, looks toward the kitchen. “Get over yourself, Sirius. And either get out of the fucking closet or leave me and everyone else alone.” She looks about to leave, but before she does, she upends her cup over Sirius’ head. He tastes Red Bull and something else that stings his eyes.

As Dorcas’ heels click away, Sirius feels eyes upon inquisitive eyes aimed his way from the kitchen. He wipes what he can from his face, smokes half a cigarette before he realises he can feel the drink getting sticky where it’s seeped into his scalp and under his shirt, and heads inside, vision slightly swimming. He’s grateful for it, honestly; it blurs from his periphery anyone who might look at him like _what happened to you?_

He passes the foyer with his head down; Lily and James and Benjy and Mary have paired off, though still idling in the doorway. Trudging through the living room, Sirius spots Peter at the very end of a large sofa, headphones plugged in, watching something on his phone. There’s a hallway where the crowds finally thin, and Sirius marches down it decidedly. Any sign of a door that screams _toilet_ would be a saving grace to him. He peeks through a door on his left, glowing warm yellow round its edges and welcomingly ajar, only to find himself a voyeur.

The walls are purple, the bedsheets are black, and Ros’ hair is curls of platinum blonde spread on the soft black backdrop like a halo. She’s clothed, as is Remus, and Sirius thinks, feeling the air in his lungs solidify, feeling himself only able to pull smaller and smaller breaths, that he’d rather have fallen upon ravenous shagging than _this_. Ros’ smile is toothy and Remus laughs and mutters something undoubtedly warm and undoubtedly sweet or charmingly snippy before he kisses her tender. Sirius raps knuckles against the doorframe without control. He can’t feel it when his fingers or lips move. They look at him. Remus has to twist over his shoulder.

“Hi there, sorry.” He’s grinning, can feel it strain his face, but doesn’t know from where within he’s dredged it. “Point me to the loo?”

Ros looks between Sirius and Remus, rising onto her elbows, and says, “Next door on the left.”

Sirius himself doesn’t look at Remus. He’s not sure he can. “Thank you.”

He pushes past anyone lying between him and the door. Once he’s made it to the foyer, it just so happens to be Benjy, who, when Sirius tries to elbow past, reaches for him with a worried, “Mate, are you —?”

So Sirius shoves him up against the wall and out of his way.

“What the fuck, Sirius?” mutters Lily. Mary steps back tremulously.

Benjy’s still mid-wince. He reaches for the back of his head. James tries to clamp a hand around Sirius’ arm, eyes hardened and warning, but then Benjy says, “Let him go, Jamie, he’s having mummy issues,” and Sirius, insensate, launches at him, fist striking jaw, hand wrenching collar. Everything blurs, his heart bleeds and lurches and _bleeds_. He’s stumbling backward toward the stairs, then, feels the pressure of James’ handprint on his chest from where he’d pushed him away.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” wheezes James, taking a forward step, and Sirius’ blood bubbles, boils beneath his skin. James must sense it, because he snorts and says, “Don’t even think about it. Get the fuck out of here.”

Sirius runs out into the rain. It’s pouring now, puddling by the kerb, and there’s a hole in his left boot so his sock’s soaked in seconds. He knows the Tube stop means walking left but instead he walks right. It’s a wonder he’s upright because for several minutes now he hasn’t been able to catch a whole breath, just bits and scraps of air that get caught in his swollen throat and make his temples overheat and his chest clench and his eyes burn and prickle and _oh, no, not this, I don’t like this_. But any tears he cries disappear into the rain and the drink on his skin. It’s almost the same with the blood; he smashes his fist, over and over and over, into the metal gate of some private property. The _clang_ is deafening but it covers it well enough when he cries out and the blood on his raw, blistering knuckles mixes with the rain on his skin though it stains it red, obvious and runny on his pale hands.

He curls in on himself under the cover of a bus stop, knees drawn up, left hand clutching the right as if the latter might fall to pieces without support. The woman who joins him under the shelter says nothing, and he doesn’t know if that’s for the better or the worse.


	6. Boys liking boys

**MONDAY 8:59**

First period on Monday is always English Lit with James, Benjy, and Peter, but when Sirius walks up to the classroom door a minute before class is to start, sees them clustered at their usual table, a mottled bruise on Benjy's jaw and a seat open beside James for himself, he can't bring himself to join them.

He retreats to the Robotics lab. There's a year thirteen class in session but the teacher is the head of RobSoc and doesn't bat an eye as Sirius slips into the classroom, gives a two-fingered wave, and settles behind an unoccupied computer. It's not a strong enough distraction, though, and all the words on the screen blur and rearrange themselves to mock him. His mind rattles and he only notices he's bouncing his leg when the girl beside him leans over and mutters _can you quit it?_ because he's jiggling the table.

He's back at the door of the English Lit classroom by the period's end. Counterintuitively, though, his confidence gives out as people begin to pour out the door, and he has fifteen minutes before he needs to be at Computer Science but decides then that early is better than _literally any other option_. 

But, of course, he doesn't succeed at escaping because somewhere behind him James says "Sirius." If he didn't feel like a fugitive to his own guilt, he might've kept walking. Instead he swivels on the ball of his foot, clutching the straps of his bag, and lays eyes on James. He's gone stony and cold; it doesn't help Sirius decipher his mood and determine how carefully he must tiptoe, as James has looked this way before, both when Sirius made an insensitive joke about the jumper Peter's mum knit for him and when Sirius ate the last of the chocolate James had brought back from a trip to Switzerland. Students shove by at both their sides, and Sirius can see Benjy and Peter's backs as they retreat in the opposite direction.

“Here,” mutters James, nodding to the bench along the wall. They both take their seats.

Sirius holds his breath, pinching hard on the center of his lower lip before he looks at the ceiling and asks, “How pissed off is Benjy?”

James takes a moment to respond. “He's not.”

Sirius' eyes flit to him. “No?”

“No. None of us are angry, Sirius. Just worried about you.” James scratches his neck, runs fingers up through the back of his hair. Sirius has seen him do it a million times.

He looks away, clasping his hands together and squeezing so the pad of each fingertip digs hard into a bony knuckle.

“Well?”

Sirius frowns, setting his nose against his knuckles. “Well what?”

“You're not gonna try and tell me there's no reason to worry?” James chuckles, tone dry. “That's progress. You're only lying by omission.”

Sirius' sigh is a hiss out his nose that fades into the commotion of the clearing corridor. “I don't know, mate. It's the usual shit. My mum —”

“It's _not_ the usual shit, though. When was the last time you saw your mum?” James' gaze is so unwavering it unsettles Sirius' stomach. “Sirius, it's weeks now you've been like this. Distancing yourself from us and disappearing and then coming back and exploding on fucking _Benjy_ , it's not... _like_ you. I don't know what it is you don't want to talk to me about, but frankly, after Friday, I'm fucking _scared_ , and I'd rather have you vent or rant than get all violent on your _friends_.” James pushes his glasses up his nose, hand wavering in the air before he sets it on Sirius' shoulder, warm and firm and clasped over the round of bone. “I wanna help, mate, I really fucking do, but if you don't want me to, then please, sort it out before you hurt someone even worse. Or hurt yourself.”

James squeezes his shoulder down to the bone, pats Sirius on the cheek, then hoists his rucksack over his shoulder and disappears down the hall.

Sirius is halfway to sitting down in Computer Science when he freezes in mid-air, deciding against it. He shoves the chair back under the table. Amaline arches a brow.

Sirius meets her eyes, then promptly clutches his stomach. “Sorry. Explosive diarrhea round two.” He strides out of the classroom and heads for the Underground.

**MONDAY 12:22**

It's a forty minute ride to the Tube stop nearest Regulus' school. _Nearest_. Sirius scoffs. It doesn't matter what the walk from there to school is for Regulus — Sirius is twenty minutes in out of twenty fucking five — when he's forbidden from taking public transport and is driven there and back each day. But Sirius doesn't exercise much and he's been speed-walking in an effort to arrive before the lunch period ends and his legs are pulsing with overworked heat.

The schoolyard is fenced in by chain link at least twice Sirius' height. The school itself is impressive, but the desolate, concrete yard and the metal fencing make it look rather institutional. He grimaces, curling fingers into the chain link. Climbing it wouldn't be a problem if there weren't barbed wire curling all along its top.

Distantly, closer to the school, dozens upon dozens of boys in uniforms of navy and gray mill about, kicking at rocks on the ground or at a ball. He can tell a few faces turn his way, and more and more do the longer he stares and clings to the fence — unsurprising given he must look like a vagrant with his longtime untrimmed hair and jeans with holes in the knees — and he's just about to pull his phone out and text Regulus when one navy-and-gray blob pulls away from the crowd and heads toward him, back held in distinct poise and steps discomfiting in their confidence.

Regulus has his hands in his pockets when he stops a few feet from the fence. “What the fuck are you doing here?” he asks, sounding bored and squinting against the sun pouring through a crack in the gray sky and heating the back of Sirius' head.

Sirius rattles the fence. “What the hell is this?” He looks between Regulus and the chain link. “See, I knew Mum had you transfer schools, but if I'd known she'd put you in a prison as opposed to one of those posh schools where they play croquet and offer hors d'œuvre in the Canteen, I would've come to break you out, mate.”

Regulus never liked Sirius' sense of humour. All he does is scrunch his nose. “What the fuck are you —”

“Christ,” Sirius groans loudly, tossing his head back and then pinning Regulus again with his gaze. “Can't we just talk? Why are you acting like I'm distant-cousin-Jocelyn from South Africa?”

Regulus shrugs, shifts his weight. “You never responded to my messages.”

Sirius blinks. “I thought they were rhetorical.”

Regulus rolls his eyes. “If you keep walking around the east side of the building, you'll find a yard back there. There's a hole in the fence by the big Ash. I'll meet you there.” Then he turns, starts his traipse in the direction of the school.

Sirius huffs incredulously at Regulus' back. “What makes you think I'm familiar with tree species?”

“A hole by a tree, Sirius, it’s not that difficult.”

He finds it, mainly because there’s three trees out back and it takes him two guesses to pin the big Ash. The walk around the school makes him vaguely nervous for all the security cameras pointed both inward and outward, but he quickly realises it isn’t the wrath of whoever’s behind the cameras that he fears, but his mother, and she can’t touch him anymore.

Regulus is sitting at a picnic table in the shade of the Ash as Sirius wrestles his way through the hole, first getting his sleeve caught on the chain link and then his rucksack strap. “Fucking hell,” he hisses, stumbling onto the grass. Regulus looks irritatingly cocksure with his elbows against the table behind him and his legs crossed, looking on with amusement as Sirius crawls only further across London to see his brother.

Sirius throws his bag down and takes a seat beside Regulus, who then feels around in the stupid little pocket on the breast of his navy jacket, emblazoned with the school crest. He produces from it a tightly-rolled joint, and from the pockets of his ironed slacks a lighter.

Sirius’ jaw drops. “Since when do you smoke?”

Regulus’ eyes are critical as he cups his hand over the joint, protecting the flame from a crisp breeze that chills Sirius’ chest where the scooped neck of his t-shirt hangs low. “Since when do you have hair like fucking Tarzan?” Regulus retorts around a curl of smoke. He holds the joint out to Sirius. “You look unwashed.”

Sirius snatches the joint from his brother and pinches at the end of his hair. “It’s not that long,” he protests under his breath, and he’s halfway through a drag when he comes up for air coughing and blinking madly. “What the hell?” he rasps and stares accusingly at the joint. “That’s fucking —” He coughs again — “ _strong_.” Sirius shakes his head. “Where did you get that?”

Regulus only shrugs and takes back his spliff. He says nothing for a while, leaving Sirius to scratch at his throat and brood in silence over his lung capacity. Then Regulus, tapping the shiny toe of his leather shoe against the ground a few times, hums and looks his way again. “You’re missing class,” he says slowly, like he’s just realised, “to knock about with me.”

Sirius hums consideringly, sets his elbows on his knees. “When you put it that way, I almost sound like a good brother.”

Regulus snorts. “Yeah. _Weird_ , innit?”

Sirius rolls his eyes, doesn’t beg for the joint back nor Regulus does offer it. “Er,” he starts, pinching at the bridge of his nose. He can feel that Regulus is watching him, but Sirius focuses on twisting his fingers together until his knuckles ache. “I’ve been thinking a lot about this one thing recently.”

Silence. A fallen, dried-up leaf catches on Sirius’ bootlace as it blows by and he kicks it away.

“But now it’s not just one thing anymore, because the _thing_ is having babies and they won’t leave me alone and I can’t explain it to anyone because it’d just fuck everything up.” Sirius drops his forehead to his tangle of fingers with a tight breath. “I always say the wrong thing. I already fucked things up with Gil when I tried, and now there’s James and Benjy and — everything is _shit_. I can’t sleep because everything’s shit.”

The bench creaks as Regulus shifts on it. “Practise explaining it to me,” he mutters, stubbing out the joint between their legs.

Sirius glances at him and scans his profile.

“Don’t look so skeptical,” says Regulus, elbows again on the table. “I promise I won’t get mad, is that what you want? You don’t have to worry about fucking it up. I’m pretty good at smelling bullshit, especially yours, but I also know when you’re being genuine.”

Sirius grimaces.

Regulus smirks. “Well, go on, then.”

Sirius’ eyes drift, and for a while he stares at a street sign in the distance by the road. Then he clears his throat. “I’m — I’m gay.”

Regulus waits, or so Sirius thinks. He’s collected, neutral, unflinching when Sirius finally looks over, though not at his eyes, not at first — they would reveal the most. He accidentally does, though, when Regulus chokes out, “ _Oh_.” And then, “Oh, are you finished?”

Sirius narrows his eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Regulus doesn’t answer his question. “You haven’t told anyone? Jesus, I might’ve thought — oh, shit.” Regulus goes quiet, then looks at Sirius. Sirius wonders vaguely if his concerned head tilt is affected. “You haven’t told James because you like him, yeah?”

Sirius’ eyes are wild now. “ _James?_ What — Oi! _Why_ did we barrel past the fact that I just came out to you?!”

For a moment Regulus’ mouth is open and nothing comes out. He uncrosses his legs, sits up straighter, adjusts his blazer, and slaps his hands down on his thighs. His frown is thoughtful. “Sorry. I knew you’d figure yourself out eventually, but I suppose I couldn’t have known when that would be. Congratulations, though. I’m sure it’s been emotionally taxing.”

Sirius doesn’t like that Regulus is so sure of himself, so sure of what he thinks of Sirius. He swallows against the lump in his throat, can’t decide where to look. Eventually it’s the dead grass underfoot. “Why do you say it like that?” It’s hard to piece together words to explain how he feels. “Like… as if you know me, which…” He shakes his head quickly, brows jerking with the effort to maintain his composure. “You _don’t_.”

“I used to,” says Regulus calmly. “And… it wasn’t because of the things Mum called you, or the things I saw in your computer history. You looked up _tits_ more than anything else of that ilk, really, and still it was barely noticeable amongst all the game geek emulators and cheats and shit like that.”

Sirius laughs, insincere and quiet, and he’s about to argue back even when there’s nothing on his mind but _this isn’t helping, this isn’t going well,_ nothing to scrape off and shoot back when he suddenly doesn’t even know himself and _Regulus_ claims to.

“Don’t look so sorry for yourself,” Regulus mutters. There’s a smile in his voice and it grates on Sirius’ nerves. “It wasn’t any of those things.” In Sirius’ peripheral vision, Regulus crosses his legs again. “I didn’t know what it meant to be gay. Not for a long time. I heard the word tossed around, and never in a good way.” Regulus pauses then, looks his way, and Sirius just wishes he’d get to the point. “Do you remember how often James used to come around?”

Sirius’ eyes close. “ _Yes_ , but —”

“I know you liked him, Sirius. When I realised that was a thing that could _be_ , like, boys liking boys, my first thought was _oh, like the way Sirius likes James Potter_.”

Sirius coughs, heat pricking at his suddenly tender skin. It hurts to touch. His fingers are so tangled it hurts to unravel them. “Regulus, just shut the fuck up.”

Regulus hums. “I mean, we’re only here because you wanted to talk about this, so if you’ve changed your mind, I’ve got…” He checks his stupid silver wristwatch. “Two minutes ’til History.”

“No,” Sirius says abruptly. “Just… _fuck_ ,” he hisses, caging his fingers over his face. His breath is a whimper and he feels like a kicked dog, like when he did when he’d awoken at midnight at eight years old, terrified and embarrassed and flushed with distress because he’d only wet the bed. “Do you think he knew?” he whispers.

“James?” Regulus drums his fingers fingers against the bench.

Sirius listens to this for three beats before he swats at them with a hushed _“Stop.”_

Regulus rolls his eyes. “No, I don’t think so. I don’t think he knew.”

Sirius nods, then sniffs, an ugly, snotty noise. “Thank god he’s selectively dense,” he murmurs, dabs at his eyes with the back of his wrist.

Beside him, Regulus chuckles. There’s a touch to Sirius’ shoulder, like a bump of knuckles he doesn’t see. “Do you still like him?”

Sirius swallows hard and shakes his head.

“Then you don’t have to tell him everything. Just tell him what matters most.”

“That’s the thing, though. Why does it _matter?_ It shouldn’t matter who I like, but I know it’s going to.”

Regulus sighs. “It’s not who you like that matters. It’s that it’s got you like this, Sirius. Think about it. You came across the city to talk to _me_ about it.” He chuckles. “It’s got you that twisted.”

Sirius drops his hands from his face. “You know you’re an arsehole?”

Regulus shrugs one shoulder. “I’d forgotten, I guess. Good thing you came all this way to remind me.”

Sirius just gazes at him, then rolls his eyes away.

“Do you want to hug me?” asks Regulus, and Sirius scoffs.

“No.”

“Should I go to History?”

“No.” Sirius pinches at his lower lip. “Just… tell me what I should do.”

Regulus drums his fingers again. “I don’t know the whole story, but… talk to James, I’d say. Apologise to anyone you’ve been a dick to.”

Sirius nods, pillows his face against his palms again. “But then… there’s this bloke. The one who’s got me all… twisted.”

Regulus stops tapping. “One step at a time.” And Sirius almost smiles at that, until Regulus adds, “You can only blame blokes so much for your sexuality, no more than I can blame rare strains of weed for my gluttony.”

Sirius frowns. “That is...”

“Not the same?”

“No.”

“Yeah, I figured.”

The schoolyard is quiet, no longer ricocheting with the shouts and conversation of the lunch period. “You should go to History.”

Regulus exhales, smoothing out his blazer and tugging up his sagging uniform socks. Sirius stays where he is while Regulus stands, taller than he remembers, legs like pins in the loose gray trousers. “Well.”

Sirius nods, standing too and clearing his throat. As he picks up his bag, he says, “Er, don’t give my regards to Mum.”

“I would never.” Regulus smiles.

“Don’t smoke too much.”

Regulus laughs, sliding his hands into his pockets and looking Sirius over. “You know that most of my texts aren’t rhetorical, right?” His lips thin as he shrugs. “You can text me.”

“Oh.” Sirius hassles a hand through the back of his hair. “I was just planning on coming out here every time I wanted to talk to you.”

“Ah. So I’ll see you next in, what, a year?”

Despite himself, Sirius’ lips quirk. “I should think more often than that, now I know my brother’s a dealer.”

“There’s a waitlist you’ll have to join. My clientele is coveted.”

“No family discount?”

Regulus wrinkles his nose, shakes his head. “You moved out. Sorry.” The hard lines of his face, so similar to their father’s, but rounded at the cheeks and the tip of his nose, soften when he smiles. “But I can offer you a hug.”

Sirius chokes out a laugh, putting his rucksack between them. “Why do you want to hug me so bad?”

Regulus mirrors his grin. “I don’t know. Touch-starved? Absentee parents?”

“Fucking hell.” Sirius shrugs the straps of his bag over his shoulders, body wracked, shaken with laughter. “Better than ever-present parents?”

Regulus shrugs halfheartedly. “Maybe just a little.”

Unspoken apologies and memories and thoughts perfuse the air between them. They’re almost of a height — when did that happen? Sirius moves forward, then, to pull his brother into him, clap him on the back and tousle the ringlets on his head. For those few seconds, Regulus sinks into him, thin arms steady around Sirius’ waist, pointed chin jutting into his shoulder. He pries Sirius off him by the shoulders, holding him at arm’s length and looking him in the eyes until Sirius can stand to look back. _You’ll be fine_ , he says without speaking it, and pats Sirius’ shoulder once more before starting toward the school.

Sirius thinks about the walk back to the Tube stop as he stumbles through the hole in the fence. By the time he makes it back to school, he’ll only have two hours left.

Instead he makes a stop at Tesco to fill a bag with glazed Krispy Kreme doughnuts.

**WEDNESDAY 4:06**

Wednesdays are bad on principle.

Sirius didn’t turn up to school on Tuesday and came late that morning, hasn’t seen his friends since he walked out Monday afternoon. He’d told Gil the day prior he was ill and _highly-contagious_ to ward him off from entering with the sauceless ravioli he said he’d warmed up for him. And though he’d spent the whole day in just his pants, sitting in bed and doing the homework he’d neglected in his funk, a setup seemingly conducive to pining and wallowing, he didn’t think deeply of Remus.

He thought about Regulus’ observations. James had long since admitted to liking Lily Evans with the red hair and jumpers with cats on them and the best marks in their class, but three years in a row, she’d brushed off his annual attempts to ask her out. And in the meantime, James had noncommittally ‘dated’ as much as anyone their age might’ve — few-week stints with this and that girl, on and off.

Sirius had hated every single one of them.

Frankly, he thought he might’ve hated the revolving door of James’ girlfriends for years to come, all the way until he got married and had Sirius be his best man, standing two feet away while he pledged his life and love to a woman that wasn’t Sirius. He had, naturally, been in over his head.

Then Sirius moved away from home. Amidst the chaos of change, it became easier to put aside his feelings and act like he’d known what he was doing all along the way most people thought he did.

And then Remus came along.

That’s where Sirius is now. _And then Remus came along_. He rolls his eyes at himself. He’s alone in the Robotics lab, rucksack on the table, facedown against it. The final bell’s just rung and there’s a commotion in the halls and outside as students pour out into the chill of the gray October afternoon.

 _Remus_. He’d seen him that morning in passing, but Remus hadn’t noticed him. Sirius, though, had been dumbstruck. He’d gone days without laying eyes on Remus, and just when he’d begun to feel reassured, steady-footed after talking to Regulus, he’d melted right back into his shoes because of Remus and the way he’s a few inches above everyone else and the way his hair adds a few more and the way he’d tied his hoodie strings in a bow at his throat. But Sirius had turned his back in the corridor while Remus passed, pretended to rifle through his bag, because _one step at a time_. James would be first, always, even if Remus was the one to quake Sirius’ ground, make him realise his mania for James had been more than that of a possessive best mate.

**_Sirius: Hey have you left yet?_ **

James is prompt and for that, Sirius is grateful.

**_James: nope. emerging victoriously from the library with the last available copy of jane eyre_ **

**_James: laugh all you want_ **

Sirius smiles into the rough cloth of his bag.

**_Sirius: wanna get noodles?_ **

**_Sirius: i’ll buy_ **

It takes seventeen seconds to get a reply if Sirius goes by the clicks of the wall clock.

**_James: always down for noods_ **

**_James: meet at the bike rack_ **

James is unchaining his bike when Sirius arrives. James doesn’t greet him verbally but nods, hands Sirius the bag off his back. It feels like it’s been months since he’s done this but Sirius knows the steps. James wheels his bike off the rack, Sirius slips James’ bag on like he’s got an extra-large turtle shell on his back, and once James has sat on, he holds the bike still so Sirius can settle on the back, hands gripping James’ waist. And, as per routine, James nearly bowls over a group of boys chatting amongst themselves in the middle of the schoolyard.

James locks up his bike outside the noodle shop while Sirius gets in line. He orders for them both with tutoring money he doesn’t have yet, lamenting how expensive brooding is as he scans the receipt; see Exhibit Doughnut from Monday afternoon.

Sirius hands James his carton and a fork because James can’t eat with chopsticks to save his life. Were they on better terms, Sirius would ask _hey, James, what kind of life-or-death circumstances would you have to eat yourself out of with chopsticks?_ but instead, befitting the terms, a hearty gust of wind flaps Sirius’ scarf from where it’s tucked under the collar of his jacket and straight into his face. James smirks as Sirius jabs his scarf into place with his chopsticked hand — the bastard doesn’t even offer to hold his noodles — and they take a seat on a riverside bench.

James flicks open the carton, letting steam escape into the air and fog his glasses as he peers in. “Did you get me beef?”

“No, James, I specifically asked for _tofu_ ,” Sirius says with such blankness that James is immediately satisfied and fishes for a hunk of beef with his plastic fork.

Sirius can only stomach a mouthful of noodles. He closes the carton with fumbling fingers and is peeling his cigarettes from his back pocket when James, with a bit of noodle on his cheek, says, “Hey, don’t throw the chopsticks away yet.”

Sirius pins him with a withering look. “Can’t this be a fucking exception —”

“You’re going to look back on this day in the photo album I show my grandchildren, Sirius, and there’ll be nothing but a blank page. If you wanted to avoid this, you should’ve rethunk your cuisine of choice.”

Sirius stares. Then, “Fine.”

He pokes the fat ends of the chopsticks under his upper lip, turns his head toward James with his best walrus smile, two fingers raised. James has his phone camera at the ready, squinting at the screen as he captures the moment. Sirius relaxes, works his mouth so the chopsticks fall into his lap, and replaces them with a cigarette as James, satisfied, files the picture into an album filled with near-identical ones.

“Uncle Sirius will thank me when he’s holding little baby Elvendork in one hand and the book I plan to make in the other,” mutters James.

Sirius snorts. “As if I’d hold Elvendork with only one hand. I don’t think there’s insurance for dropping babies.”

James smiles over at him, still preoccupied by his phone.

Sirius flicks open his lighter, and onto the tail end of a long inhale and exhale breathes, “You’re right. It’s not the usual shit.”

James puts his phone away. His dark brows are one big furrow as he eyes Sirius, and holds his hand out for the pack though Sirius knows he’s got his own. He hands it over anyway. “Good start,” grants James.

“You just like being right,” Sirius huffs. He looks out on the river, murky and green. “I mean, it is the usual shit. But there’s also… the thing is, I think — no, I _know_ the reason I’ve been like this. And I’ve just… I didn’t know how to talk about it.” The wind is blowing Sirius’ way, and it blows the smoke from James’ cigarette across his line of sight. “Because I like someone.”

James’ _hm_ of thought is cheery. “Dorcas?”

Sirius nearly laughs. “No, not Dorcas.” He wipes his clammy palm off on his jeans. _Okay, okay, okay —_ “It’s not a girl.”

James breathes. Sirius thinks he might nod, doesn’t look his way. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

James is quiet. Then he’s suddenly in Sirius’ space, slinging his arm across his shoulders and shaking him gently. “That’s brilliant, mate,” he says with such sincerity it sticks Sirius’ tongue to the roof of his mouth as he tries to swallow. “Not, like, _you like blokes, that’s awesome_ , but more like it’s brilliant you _told_ me. Wait — not that liking blokes isn’t awesome, because it _is_ , it totally is, but —” He pauses in the midst of waving about his cigarette. Sirius looks him in the eyes then, flicks the bit of noodle off James’ face.

James whips about to see what Sirius has done, thrown off, patting a hand about on his cheek and eventually surrendering to confusion. “You get my drift?”

Sirius’ lips curve into a slow smile. “I got your drift.”

James sighs, nods. “Good.”

Under James’ arm, Sirius is slumped in on himself, one hand pressed tight between his knees, the other letting his cigarette burn away. At least he is until James, seemingly relaxed, jolts into panic-mode and clenches his hand around Sirius’ shoulder. “Holy fuck,” breathes James, and Sirius is irrationally frightened. _Holy fuck, I knew you were in love with me?_ Then James says, “Mate,” slowly and tentatively.

Sirius is frozen. “What?”

“The jokes.” James is staring at the bridge… or somewhere into the beyond. “The sodding gay jokes. Sirius, mate, I’ve made so many fucking jokes and I didn’t —” He simply gapes. His hand is empty, his cigarette’s long gone. “If that’s why you didn’t — _feel okay_ telling me, I’m… _shit_ , I’m so fucking sorry.”

Sirius’ exhale is so shuddering that James’ eyes pool with concern. Then he smiles, wobbly, and shakes his head. “Just don’t be a dick.”

James grimaces.

Reconsidering, Sirius corrects, “About things you shouldn’t be a dick about. Like… women or race or me being…” He licks his lips. “Me being gay. Or anyone.”

James smiles. “Manageable. And… sock me in the face if I ever am. Just, like, warn me first, ‘cos Mum’s a stickler about me taking care of my glasses.”

Sirius snorts, brings his cigarette to his lips again. “I’d rather not be the one who goes around socking his mates ‘cross their faces.”

“You already are.” James finally tucks himself comfortably against Sirius’ side, though his thick hair is like bristles against Sirius’ cheek. “Who is it, then?”

“Hm?” Sirius tilts his head back to blow out the smoke.

“The dude you like. Is it me?”

“ _No_ ,” Sirius breathes, and his elbow reflexively jabs into James’ side. “No, what the hell.”

James withdraws. “Okay, Jesus.” He frowns at the river, nose scrunched. “But — why not? Why are you so bloody — _vehement?_ Should I be insulted? I’m not half-bad, Sirius!”

Sirius regards him with a half-smile, then crosses his legs and looks over the river. “Would it _appease_ you if I said I used to?”

“Really?”

Sirius feels queasy suddenly and there’s only a mouthful of noodles sitting in the pit of his stomach. _Too much too soon. One step at a time._ Sirius sneaks a look at James, who… only looks intrigued. And is staring intently at Sirius’ mouth. It’s clumsy, but Sirius blurts out an, _“Oh no you fucking don’t,”_ when James starts to lean in, smushing his hand into his face and knocking his glasses askew.

James is discontented as he rubs his nose. “Ow.”

Sirius can only shake his head slowly in disbelief.

“Why not?” James asks offhandedly as he recoils, scratching the back of his neck.

Sirius laughs suddenly, clear and resounding enough to feel the need to muffle it with the back of his hand. “I _can’t_ believe you just tried to fucking kiss me.”

James rolls his eyes, sprawls his arms out across the back of the bench. Sirius feels an insistent finger jab at his spine between his shoulder blades. “At least I tried, while you basically just went and called me unfuckable.”

“Fucking hell,” mutters Sirius, too amused to even fret about the healing wound that is his pitiful crush on James. “Listen, if we both make it to forty, single and without prospects or youthful luster, then I’ll kiss you.” Sirius’ lips purse, tilting his head James’ way. “But I wouldn’t get your hopes up about fucking.”

“The more I think about it, the scarier the thought gets,” James says hollowly and meets his eyes. “No offence.”

Sirius laughs again, this time so hard he comes down from it with a shrill _oh god_. “None taken.”

“Sorry, that — escalated quickly. And de-escalated even quicker.”

“Nah, I like this, you in emotional turmoil instead of me.”

“Bastard.” James chuckles and Sirius feels the rumble of it in his chest. “Well, who is it? The bloke you like?”

Sirius watches the river drift, reaches out with metaphysical hands. His walls are down again, his palms scrape nothing but air he can breathe freely. It’s far too easy to tell James, “Er, it’s… Remus.”

James has to think on it. “Who? Oh. Oh, fuck, the dude I hugged at Benjy’s party.”

Sirius, having forgotten, feels his cheeks pull at a grin.

“The one who gave you back your Knob lighter.”

Sirius nods, slow and wordless.

James frowns. “Doesn’t —? Doesn’t he have a girlfriend?”

Sirius hums affirmatively, drops his cigarette on the ground, and toes it out. “Yep.”

“That bitch,” James huffs.

Sirius nods vaguely, dragging open the zip on his rucksack to stick his carton of noodles in, knowing fully well it’ll smell like takeaway for the next two weeks. “Hot and cold is the best way to describe it. Him. Everything.”

James shrugs. “Forget him, mate. Now that I know who you’re _really_ on the market for, I’ll have you set up within the week.”

Sirius snorts to cover a wince as his finger slices on the edge of a paper inside his bag. He sticks his fingertip in his mouth, pulls the culprit out. “I won’t stand for you going around trying to pawn me off on all your straight mates from the football team,” he mutters half-coherently around his fingertip, unfolding the paper.

“ _Straight?_ Oh, Sirius, love, if you knew what really went on in those locker rooms — what’s that?”

Sirius stares at a line of inked symbols too long for his memory to piece together. “Hold it,” he mutters, shoving the paper into James’ hands.

“Is this what Computer Science homework looks like?” asks James, perturbed, as he rotates the page in his hand.

“No, it’s —” Sirius uncaps a pen with his teeth, resting his phone on one thigh and snatching the paper from James to pin it to his other. Swiftly, he scrawls the letters above their symbols, eyes flashing from screen to paper.

James is practically _on_ him trying to read it; Sirius can feel his warm breath against his cheek as he mouths the words. _“I know you said… Wednesdays… don’t exist in my universe, but they must, because it’s Wednesday… I can feel it’s real because I can feel that I miss you.”_ James withdraws slowly. Sirius sneaks a look at him; James has his brows raised, his chin scrunched.

“Remus,” Sirius supplies dumbly, blood thrumming through his veins as it rushes upward to his cheeks. He can feel the molecular buzz of it under his skin. He folds up the note and drops it into his lap and cards exasperated fingers through his hair.

James snorts. “Bet his girlfriend wouldn’t like knowing he’s going full-on Keats on you.”

Sirius says nothing, slides his hands over his face. When he peeks through the cracks in his fingers, James has folded the note into a paper plane.

“Would you like to do the honours?” asks James, pinching the plane between his fingers.

Sirius’ hands weigh his skin down as he drags them down his face. He can feel the wind against the whites of his eyes. He shakes his head.

James sends the note sailing into the wind, over the wall and into the river where it’s soaked and swallowed by the nebulous water so fast it’s gone when Sirius runs to look.

So Wednesdays are bad on principle. But is it consolation to think that he’s had worse?


	7. God and public transport

**THURSDAY 17:30**

Sirius has the apron on, the one he'd first seen when he'd moved in — the one Gil had been wearing, arse-naked, whilst vacuuming Lily's room in preparation for Sirius' arrival. The one he'd sworn he'd never lay a finger on, _given_ that Gil had once worn it arse-naked.

But he's spent the last few days going back on foolish promises he'd made to himself. It only made sense to. He doesn't know when _keep secrets from your best mate_ had made the list, but he'd followed it to a T until he'd had noodles with James by the river. And now he's broken his apron promise... and it doesn't bother him so much.

The sound of the door to their flat opening echoes its way into the kitchen just as Sirius' water has reached a boil. Petunia's spending the week sleeping over her boyfriend's, so it's Lily and Gil's voices that he can make out through the hiss of the steam and hum of the flame under his saucepan.

“Literally what is happening,” Gil mutters flatly, but Lily grants him a far more enthused reaction as she trills, “My old pasta roller!”

Sirius glances at the apparatus on the flour-dusted countertop before he peers over his shoulder at the two in the kitchen doorway. “I don't think anybody'd touched it in years, it was practically decomposing,” says Sirius. Gil's avoiding his eyes, but Sirius doesn't even think it's because of his royal fuck-up.

“You're wearing my apron,” murmurs Gil.

Sirius bites his lip. It might not look so outlandish on Sirius were it not trimmed in frills and patterned in thin rainbow stripes. “I am. Just —” He whips toward the stove, drops a heaping of ravioli into the pot, sets the egg timer, and turns promptly again to Gil. Lily has sat down at the table, chin propped on her delicate knuckles, interest unconcealed. “Give me four minutes, yeah? They'll take four minutes at the least, and I don't wanna overcook them, and I also don't think my spiel's gonna take that long, because I always overestimate how long it takes for me to say shit, but —”

Gil's brows rise. He holds up a hand, so Sirius closes his mouth, but his heartbeat outruns the audible ticking of the timer.

“Sirius,” Gil levels, “listen, I forgive you, if this is some weird... _apology dinner_ you’ve cooked up. I'll forgive you now, in advance of your — your _blathering_ , because this is all too much at once to see you in this apron with the pasta roller out and frankly, I'm concerned. If you'd gone so far as to wear it the traditional way —” arse-naked, he means — “I would be rushing you to hospital right now.”

Sirius glances at Lily, whose eyes are closed and whose hand is clamped over her mouth. He's certain, then, that there's a smile under there. He feels his own lips tug despite himself. “I would've worn it the traditional way, but since I got home I've just been cleaning, and in case you came back early, I didn't want you to get a load of —”

“Your bits,” Lily interrupts.

“Yes, Evans, I was getting there.” Sirius' eyes flick back to Gil. Pointedly, he murmurs, “ _My bits._ ”

Gil has a hand on the doorway for stability. “You were cleaning.”

Sirius nods. His timer goes off, so he goes to peer in at the ravioli bobbing at the water's surface, pull them out with the skimmer — he'd Googled the name for it twenty minutes prior. _Ladle with holes in it_. “Most of the place, yes. Not in your room, though. Didn't dare go in there,” he mutters.

Gil is quiet for a beat, then finally snorts and takes a seat across from Lily. “Scared you'd find someone tied up in there?”

Sirius shrugs as he dumps another batch of ravioli into the pot. His back is to them so they can't see it when he smiles. “I thought I heard noises. Couldn’t tell if they were screaming for help or, like, wanking.”

Gil hums. “Well, if you'd've walked in on Saturday night between the hours of ten in the evening and three the next morning, that wouldn't have been so far off.”

There's a scuffle under the table, the cacophony of chairs screeching against tile, as Lily kicks Gil in the shin. Gil scoffs in pain, and he’s clutching his leg when Sirius looks. “I swear you've got hooves sometimes!” he hisses. “Like Mr. fucking Tumnus from _fucking_ Narnia!”

Lily smiles instead at Sirius. “So, you've been doing a spot of cleaning?”

Sirius, in the midst of sorting out a plate for each of the two at the table — a heaping of ravioli and a scoop of tomato sauce — hums his affirmation. “Er… yeah.” He smiles feebly as he slides a plate in front of them each, silverware clinking as he drops it into place. “Seeking-forgiveness-cleaning.” He stands at the head of the table, hands on his hips, and nods at the pasta. “Er, it’s — just cheese filling. Mozzarella and parmesan and ricotta.”

Lily, already with a utensil in each hand, digs in as soon as he’s finished his sentence. Gil just watches Sirius, one brow piqued.

Sirius returns his gaze, slowly pushing his hands into the rainbow pockets of the apron. “Not… in the mood for seeking-forgiveness-pasta?” he asks with a hesitant smile and hates how weak his voice sounds.

Gil’s eyes narrow. “I already forgave you. It’s just — do I have to lecture you on why the shit you said was —”

Sirius shakes his head so rapidly his brain is jostled. “No. No, I know why.” He feels his shoulders droop with the air he breathes out. “But… I’m still _so_ —”

“Just try the damn pasta, Gil,” says Lily. She gives Sirius a thumbs-up around her fork. “It’s good.”

Gil scrapes at a ravioli with his fork, then seems to relax in his chair. “It’s okay, Sirius. We’ll keep you around.” He sticks a forkful into his mouth, humming in consideration. “If, like, you do this seeking-forgiveness-pasta thing more often.”

Sirius bites down on a lazy smile, head lolling back toward the ceiling. He neglects to mention that it’s typically _his_ food that Gil pillages… for better or worse. Sirius thinks mournfully of the sauceless ravioli escapades.

**FRIDAY 12:33**

“Yeah, mate, she promised she’d loan it to me the whole weekend if I did her share of the housework _and_ paid her five quid an hour for the time I drove it… on top of paying for the petrol.”

Peter snorts, doesn’t look up from his phone. “That’s a shit deal.”

Benjy looks hurt. “Sound a little more ungrateful, would you?” He shoves half a sandwich in his mouth. “I’ll remember that the next time _you_ swindle us a vehicle to use at our leisure, Pettigrew. Oh, wait, you won’t, because your mum only believes in public transport.”

Peter huffs out a laugh. “Don’t forget God. God and public transport.”

Sirius only catches so much of Benjy and Peter’s conversation as he and James approach their table in the Canteen. It’s more than he might catch in passing, really, because once James has thrown down his bag and dug into his heaping mound of mash, Sirius is left on standby despite the open spot beside James. He fingers the strap of his rucksack tentatively. The bruise on Benjy’s jaw is yellowing unpleasantly.

“Sirius, sit down,” mutters James, but Sirius talks over him.

“Does it still hurt, mate?” he asks.

Benjy, tearing a roll in two, lifts his eyebrow. He’s peculiarly unaffected by Sirius’ sudden presence. “Does what?”

Peter promptly pokes a finger into the bruise on his cheek.

“Well, bloody hell, if you jab it like that!” Benjy glares Peter down, cupping his jaw. “Probably gave me a new fucking bruise, you little bastard.” He shakes his head, eyes flicking between James and Sirius. “I’m really not Team Pete today.”

Peter shrugs indifferently, eyes cast down to his phone screen. Sirius is willing to bet he’s messaging a girl he’d met through Minecraft last weekend.

He then sits down when it’d feel more awkward to keep standing.

“But maybe you two will appreciate it more,” Benjy says around a mouthful of roll, clearing his throat in preparation. “My sister’s coming up from uni next weekend and I’ve, ahem, _finessed_ us her car.” He preens in accomplishment. “We can drive anywhere our hearts desire.” He pops another bit of bread into his mouth. “So… so long as we’re back by Sunday night.”

“You’re a terrible driver,” James points out. “And Pete and Sirius haven’t got their licences.” He grins smugly, looking strikingly similar to a human peacock with its feathers spread as he says, “So if I’m driving, that means I’ve got the aux.”

Benjy’s jaw drops so abruptly a bit of mushy roll falls out. Sirius covers his face with his hands. “No _fucking_ way,” Benjy protests blankly, swatting the regurgitated food off the table. He turns pointedly on Peter and Sirius. “I need you both on board to ensure mutiny if he plays Neil Diamond.”

“Hey, Sirius?” Peter sets his phone facedown, laces his fingers atop it with the utmost gravity. “Er, not to like, revisit the distant past, but I feel like you should know that, uh… Dorcas may be going around, er. Spreading this mad rumour about you.”

For a few seconds, Benjy appears appalled that his Neil Diamond-mutiny goes ignored, but he picks up what Peter is putting down with interest and mirrors the way he’s leaning into the table. Sirius feels himself in an interrogation room, behind two-way mirrors with the fluorescence of a singular lamp blinding his eyes. “Yeah, definitely not trying to dredge up the ancient history of — of last Friday,” says Benjy. “Because I’m over it. I’m totally over it, the whole — _slugging me like we’re doing MMA on Sky Sports_ thing. But she’s telling _everyone_ , and —”

Sirius feels the steadiness of James’ presence beside him. “She’s telling everyone I’m gay?” he murmurs. It’s not so much a surprise. He’s more shocked his heart doesn’t drop to his stomach than he is about Dorcas’ meddling.

He realises that since he sat down, he hasn’t let go of his bag, clutching it to his chest as a pillar of support.

Benjy and Peter exchange a look. Then Peter clears his throat and sheepishly says, “Yeah.”

“Just ignore it,” follows Benjy swiftly. “Like, girls need to learn that just because it doesn’t work out between you, doesn’t mean you’re fucking —”

“It’s true,” says Sirius.

“— gay.” Benjy blinks. “What?”

Peter seems to smile a bit. The corners of Sirius’ lips tug upward when he notices, because… naturally, Peter and Benjy aren’t on the same page.

He nods, tenting his fingers and drumming them together. “She’s right.” Sirius’ eyes wind a path to James, who’s held a forkful of mash inches from his lips for who knows how long. He smiles at Sirius in _that way_ , the way that forms a crease between James’ nose and upper lip, the way that Sirius had once poked fun at when they’d been ten years old before he’d realised he treasured the smile far too much to shame James about it.

For a moment, Benjy looks on the verge of accosting James — _you knew?!_ — but then all he does is stuff the rest of his roll into his mouth. “Hm.”

“So, all the girls…” Peter begins, cheeks rounded by the fond spread of his smile.

Sirius shrugs, focused downward on his hands. “One part confusion, one part delusion.” His lips thin. Then he chuckles in mild disbelief. It feels like his chest is an hourglass and he’s finally cracked it, the weight of the sand pouring out. “One part fucking fake.”

Benjy points a carrot stick at him. “If the robots fail you, consider acting. Had me fucking fooled.”

Peter’s laugh is a sniff. “Hey, Ben, remember two winters ago when we convinced you to write to Father Christmas?”

James drops his fork of mash and slams a hand into the table. His cackle echoes through the Canteen, and Sirius props his chin in his hand. _Perhaps at some point heads will stop turning because I’m the gay bloke. But they’ll never stop turning because of my loudmouth best mate._

“And he —” James is _wheezing,_ halfway to monkey-screeching — “and he thought the fucking letter was _real!”_

“Yeah, yeah, ’til I saw your essay draft was in Saint fucking Nick’s handwriting,” Benjy grumbles. “Why are we talking about this?”

“As if Sirius should be proud of fooling you,” Peter explains plainly, thumbing open his phone.

Benjy blinks once, twice. “That’s it. You’re riding in the boot, Pettigrew.”

**TUESDAY 14:29**

Sirius is mid-reply to a text from Amaline about their Computer Science assignment, wandering down a mostly-empty corridor, when he looks up at the sound of a laugh that sets off klaxons in his mind.

Remus is at the other end of the hall, clapping some bloke on the back. And his head is turned over his shoulder but Sirius could recognise his hair anywhere, those unruly tufts, his long legs in clingy jeans, the lazy roll of his ankles as he steps as if they're a little weak. Then Remus turns fully and Sirius is in trouble; he hasn't received a note since the prior Wednesday but that doesn't quite mean he wants head-on confrontation, not unless he gets another note that explicitly says _so about that night with my girlfriend..._ The closest door he tries is fucking locked. So he covers his eyes with his hand and charges headfirst into the next closest — the girls' toilet.

“I’m sorry!” he hollers as he clambers to shut the door behind himself, a clumsy act in which he gets his bag jammed in the door and has to peek between his fingers to sort it out. “It's an emergency, please, I'm sorry,” he's babbling, possibly to a deserted toilet, but _better safe than sorry_ , he thinks.

For a moment there's silence — _I'm safe!_ — and then an exasperated sigh. “It's just me, I think.”

Sirius lowers his hand slowly. It's Dorcas, leaning over the sink with a mascara wand in one hand, eyes gunning him down through the mirror. He breathes in sharply, which Dorcas must take as a threat, because she immediately states, “I don't even want to know, Sirius.”

“Know what?” He pushes off the door, the quick staccato of his heart slowing in tempo.

“Whatever you're doing.” She shakes her head, swipes mascara onto her upper lashes. “I just don't want to know.”

His lips purse. He approaches her like she's a frightened animal. _Doe Eyes_ , he remembers thinking about her. He rolls his eyes at himself. “Hey —”

“Don’t,” she hisses warningly, her head whipping to face him.

“Dorcas, please —”

"Don't."

“ _Listen_ to me!” Sirius only realises he's shouted when it rings in his own ears and Dorcas' hand looks ready to snap the mascara wand in two. "Sorry," he murmurs. “Just — please listen. I'm _sorry_.”

She's facing the mirror again.

“I didn't mean for things to — to spiral the way they did. And you're — you're great, alright? I came up to you at Mary's party because I thought you were the prettiest one there and I just needed to _try_ , I thought if I kept trying again and again it just might work, and somewhere along the way trying turned into lying and faking it because trying just didn't _work_ anymore and…” He leans into the sink beside Dorcas', studying the mold in the grout between the floor tiles. “I was — _fighting_ so much with trying to get it to work in the moment that I never even thought about the future. How it might end up.”

When he tears his gaze from the floor, he finds that Dorcas is looking at him already, and now without the safety of the mirror's reflection between them.

“I never —”

“You didn't want to hurt me.” Her eyes roll, but Sirius thinks it doesn't feel so malicious. “Right. You _must_ try to understand where I'm coming from, though, Sirius, feeling this — this _humiliated,_ led on by someone I thought —”

Sirius' snort cuts her off. He smiles with trembling sympathy. “I do. Understand.”

She assesses him from head to toe, then caps her mascara, dropping it into and rifling through a little pouch with a series of _clickety-clack_ noises. “Well, I can't claim to understand what it's like to be in your shoes, but.” She breathes out then, seeming to hunch a bit smaller. “I can't imagine it helped any that I went and... told people. About you.”

Sirius chuckles then, folding his arms across his chest. “With anyone else, maybe not, but.” He shrugs. “Saved me from having to drop it cold on my friends.” He thinks of Peter and Benjy, wide-eyed and hesitant over the _rumours_. His nose wrinkles. “I wouldn't, like... go around doing that, though. With me, I don't — I don't care.” _When did I decide I don't care?_ “But with others... y'know?”

She nods faintly. “Of course.” It's level with a whisper. They stay in the middling comfort of silent, mutual understanding as Dorcas packs away her makeup, until she says, “I don't think I can forgive you, though.”

Sirius shrugs one of his shoulders. “Yeah. I get it.”

“Okay.”

He nods.

Dorcas slings her bag over her shoulder. “Bye, Sirius.” She doesn’t look at him when she passes, but he does, eyes following her to the door of the girls’ toilet.

“Bye.”

And then he’s alone.

Or so he thinks.

A toilet flushes in one of the stalls and Sirius is spooked out of his skin. The culprit shoulders their way out of the furthest stall, adjusting the drape of their hijab over their shoulder and tossing their bag onto the floor below the sink beside Sirius. Amaline smiles at him as she turns on the faucet. “ _Well_ done, Black.”

Sirius gapes at her, his fingers clawing the sink’s edge as he looks between her and the stall in outrage. “You were _in_ there?” he hisses, pointing from where she’d come. “This _whole_ time?”

She nods, unflappable as ever. “Yeah.” She soaps her hands copiously, and they both watch as the soap lathers. “I think you handled it well. Or as well as you could’ve done, you know, after weeks of pretending to like her.” Amaline’s head tilts toward him, her brows raised and her smile knowing.

Sirius half-coughs, half-laughs. While Amaline’s rinsing her hands, he mutters, “I can’t believe you spied on me.”

Amaline shrugs, and as she moves to dry her hands, saying something like, “If I’d come out then, Dorcas would’ve run off and you’d’ve never quasi-resolved whatever happened between you —” Sirius catches her by the elbow in passing. She stops in her tracks, hands dripping water to the floor and the toes of Sirius’ shoes. “What?” She looks from one of his eyes to the other.

“Does it still hold?”

Amaline blinks thrice, like she’d much rather dry her hands than stand there a second longer. “What?”

Sirius’ hand slips from her arm, falling to his side. He cracks his knuckles one by one with his thumb. “That, er… you’ll still be my friend though I’m...” He clears his throat. Then his lips quirk. “Massively queer,” he finishes eventually.

Amaline gives him a heavy-lidded look. Then sighs. “The way you’re looking at me, I think you already know the answer to that, but I’ll indulge you anyway.” She wraps him in her arms, chin level with his shoulder, and presses her cold, wet hand to the back of Sirius’ neck; he squawks but she says, “You pretty much asked for this.”

Sirius cringes at the water he can feel drip down his spine. But he hugs her back anyway, because it’s his fault he went fishing for affection, and he’ll take it where he can get it… and Amaline smells nice and her hijab is soft against his cheek.

“I’m happy to hear you think we’re friends,” Amaline amends, “and —”

“Hey,” mutters Sirius.

“ _And_ , like I said about Marlene, I don’t care what you are as long as you do your fair share of our CS projects.” She withdraws abruptly, going for the paper towel roll.

“Heartwarming,” Sirius deadpans.

Amaline smiles dryly. “Get out of the girls’ toilet, Sirius.”

**FRIDAY 17:22**

They’re in line at Maccies — James is in the process of ordering two twenty-count McNugget boxes — and Sirius is mid-fishing for his wallet. Something slips from his bag and flutters to the floor; he doesn’t pay it any mind. He has weeks’ worth of Maths problem sets and Tesco receipts lining the bottom of his bag.

But Peter picks it up, unfolds it. “What _is_ this?”

“Hm?” Sirius fumbles distractedly to the register. He taps his card against the reader. “Everybody better fucking Venmo me right now. _Forgot all your wallets_ my arse, you fucking numbskulls.”

“Whazzwhat?” James snatches the paper from Peter’s hand. “ _Oh_.”

Sirius is zipping his backpack, edging toward the pick up line once he’s been given his order receipt. He goggles at it, then turns in search of Benjy, who is nowhere to be found. “Why are there three strawberry milkshakes on here?” he huffs, and James, looking directly at him, ignores the question and waves the paper at him instead.

“Mr. I-Want-It-All strikes again.”

Peter peers around James’ shoulder. “Who?”

Benjy startles Sirius when he comes up from behind, swinging an arm across his shoulder. “What’s your Venmo again? I thought it was _WhySoSirius_ but their profile pic’s a Drake meme so I reckon it’s someone with low-grade taste in memes and poor spelling, and you’ve only one of those.”

Sirius, with the receipt crumpling between his tensed fingers, gawks for one, two, three seconds at the note in James’ hands before saying, “Er, no, it’s just _siriusblack_ , no hyphen.” He then unfeelingly pulls out his phone, tapping his way into his camera roll and to the Favorited picture of his and Remus’ alphabet. He hands it off to James. “Go nuts.”

James swipes it from his hand, grinning. The grin falters shortly. “Pete, have you got a pen?”

Peter squints. “What?”

“Get me a _fucking_ pen!” James demands. “Jesus, this is long as fuck.” Sirius’ phone chimes in James’ hand with Benjy’s Venmo payment.

“Order sixty-eight?”

Sirius eyeballs their receipt, then turns in a mechanised motion to trade their receipt for their greasy bag of food and the milkshakes no one but Benjy likes.

“Sixty-eight? So close,” Benjy whinges wistfully as he gathers the shakes into his open arms.

“ _What_ is happening?” asks Peter, bereft of the pen with which James is scribbling furiously onto Remus’ note.

Sirius sighs, trudging toward the door. He thinks the smell of chips has already seeped into his clothes and hair. “Let’s just go to the car, please.”

James takes the driver’s seat. Sirius sits shotgun with the Maccies bag. Benjy and Peter are in the boot — or where the backseat would be had Benjy’s sister not compacted the seats into the floor. The five minutes they’d tried to wrench them free had been in vain, and they’d settled on calling it a luxury, extra-large Boot Experience. Benjy and Peter at least get to enjoy the byproducts of Ben’s sister’s enthusiasm for the outdoors, pillowed by numerous rolled-up sleeping bags… amongst a fishing pole or two.

“Will someone tell me what this note is about now?” Peter asks frantically, clutching a sleeping bag to his chest. “And why it’s in _code_?”

An odd silence settles over the car as Benjy quits slurping his milkshake. “What note?”

Sirius receives a sideways glance from James that he merely nods at. Then he begrudgingly opens the bag to scrounge for his chips.

“Er,” says James, clearing his throat. “Alright, the gist of things, as far as I know, is Sirius was seeing that bloke Remus, the one who was at the first GardSoc meeting, and they —” He hesitates. “Er, hooked up, I guess, and then Remus went back to his old girlfriend and got caught and now’s been leaving Sirius these love notes in his bag in some secret nerd language they came up with together.”

Through the rearview mirror, Sirius can see that Peter’s mouth is in the shape of an ‘O’. Benjy’s forehead is crumpled as long as James is babbling, and then he holds his hand out to Sirius. “Pass me my nugs, mate?”

Sirius tosses a handful of sauce packets into the chicken nugget carton and passes it off to Benjy. Then he slumps in his seat.

Benjy deems it appropriate to think on James’ brain-dump only as long as it takes him to get a chicken nugget in his mouth, then proceeds to speak. “So like, this bloke likes you, but doesn’t wanna leave his girlfriend?”

Sirius hands James and Peter their burgers respectively. “Yep.”

Benjy chews more, then snorts. “So he’s leaving you _notes_?”

“Yep.” Sirius nibbles his lower lip, peering toward James at his right, who’s pushing his glasses up his nose and flattening Remus’ note against his leg.

Benjy gets two whole nuggets in his mouth this time before he says, “What a loser.”

Either Peter senses Sirius’ curiosity or he’s nosy himself. “Well, what’s it say?”

James’ brows lift. He looks round at all three of them, then clears his throat. “Er, says… _Your bag is always a little unzipped at the top, if you’re wondering how I get these to you. Worried my notes might have been infiltrated by the enemy, though. Looked up ‘hardest ciphers to crack’ and it might as well be in Chinese, I can’t read a thing_. The enemy, yeah, fucking right. And — just wait, here comes Mr. Keats —” James’ eyes scan to the bottom row of characters. “ _I’d need your help understanding. It’s Wednesday and I miss you and I need your help, though one more than the other. Guess which?_ ”

Benjy makes a wretching noise. “Fuck that guy.”

James hums in agreement. “And less Keats this time, more Indecisive-Two-Timer-In-Year-Fucking-Eight.”

Benjy laughs. “Literally just write him _fuck you_ in your code and Peter’ll fold it into a crane and I’ll hand-deliver it myself.”

“Yeah, I mean,” starts Peter, neglecting to deny the fact that he remembers how to fold paper cranes, “this isn’t right, Sirius. If he’s not gonna break up with his girlfriend, he can’t keep stalking you and leaving you weird notes.”

Sirius stares sullenly into his half-eaten container of chips. “S’a bit of a rude reminder, innit?” He sighs out his nose, slumping into the seat. “Every fucking week.”

“Right,” affirms James, sitting higher up the further Sirius slides down. His head nearly touches the ceiling of the car, and James isn’t even that tall. He turns his magnified gaze on Sirius, who cowers in the corner between the door and the seat. “Do you like him?”

Sirius blinks. “What?”

“Do you still like him? Remus?”

Sirius gnaws on the end of a chip. The answer springs to his mind so fast he feigns hesitation, and then says, “Yeah.”

James hands him back his phone. “Then text him right now, right _fucking_ now, like, _listen, Romulus, I’m not fucking interested if you can’t fucking make up your mind_.” James’ nod is vigorous.

Slowly, Sirius takes his phone and it feels foreign in his hand.

“As many _fuck_ s, please,” adds James.

With his brow in a furrow, Sirius contemplates James through his eyelashes, then looks tentatively at the now-closer faces of Benjy and Peter. They’ve got their heads in a line between Sirius and James’ seats.

“He can’t string you along like this, mate,” Benjy murmurs. “And — think of the environment, and how much less paper he’ll waste once he fucks off with —” He meets James’ impatient gaze and clears his throat. “Right.” Benjy claps his hands together. “Send the goddamn message.”

Sirius breathes in, out, then scrambles to sit up. “You’re right,” he mutters, finding Remus’ contact in Messenger. “I’m tired of this bullshit.”

As he types his message, the white noise of traffic and intent chewing fills the car.

**_Sirius: If you’re not interested, i’d appreciate it if you’d stop with the notes, thanks_ **

He presses send and throws his phone down into his lap. “I did it,” he breathes.

“Yeah?” James grins. Benjy pounds on the back of Sirius’ chair.

Sirius’ eyes haven’t left his black phone screen. “Wh — why isn’t he replying?”

“Maybe because you sent it two seconds ago,” mutters Peter.

Benjy slurps his shake with enthusiasm.

“Fuck him anyway.” James fastens his seatbelt. “Where were we going after this?”

Benjy pipes up, “Oh, there’s a —”

The screen lights up.

“He responded!” Sirius blurts, snatching up his phone.

**_Remus: Can you talk right now?_ **

Sirius’ heart hammers like a hummingbird’s wings. “He’s asking if I can talk,” he whispers.

Benjy scoffs. “Tell him _fuck no, I’m fuckin’ busy with my best fuckin’ mates, the world doesn’t revolve around your schedule, Reese_ —”

Sirius’ eyes peel open wide and he holds his phone with delicate fingers like it’s burning him, bleating like he’s singing opera but can’t reach the right registers, “ _Aaaah_ , he’s calling me, he’s fucking calling me!”

“Hang up that shit!” asserts Benjy, but James prises the phone from Sirius’ cramped fingers and answers the call.

“Hi, is this Remus?” A pause. “Oh, grand, hello. James Fleamont Potter at your service. Terribly sorry but Sirius is unable to speak right now —” James blinks, adjusting his glasses, silent for a beat. “He’s parked outside Maccies, the one across the street from the library, but — but mind _you_ , won’t be for long, so if you’re even _thinking_ about seeing him and squaring up, you’d better run —” James then tears the phone from his ear. “He hung up on me!” he cries, flabbergasted.

Benjy nudges Peter out of the way to crane his head into the front seat. “Is he coming?”

James, still glaring down the phone, lifts his eyes to Benjy. “What? Oh, yeah.”

Sirius shoves Benjy’s head from between him and James. “He’s _coming?_ ”

James smirks, laying Sirius’ phone on the center console. “You really put the fear of god in him with that text, mate. Sounded like he was out of breath.”

“James,” Sirius seethes, grappling for James’ shirt collar. “He’s coming _here?_ Right _now?_ ”

“Ye —” James’ features go lax. Then, “Oh, mother _fucker_.” He hurriedly unlatches his seatbelt, rolling his half-eaten burger up in its paper. “We need to get out. We need to get out of the car, _pronto_ , ándale ándale ándale.”

“Why?” Benjy bites the end of his straw.

James’ eyes are bugging as he hisses, “Because Remus. Is coming. _Here_ —” He jerks his head toward Sirius — “Right. Now!”

Benjy’s jaw drops. “Peter, grab my nugs.” He piles milkshake after milkshake into his arms. “Jamie, get the fuck out and open the sodding boot.”

“But I never got my chips!” Peter protests.

Sirius, in a silent daze, heart racing in his ears and pounding with ferocity at his pulse point, forces the whole oil-stained bag into Peter’s hands.

The driver’s seat is empty, then, abandoned by James who’s gone to open the boot. “Out you get, lads, out you get,” hounds James.

“But we have doors! There’s _doors!_ ” yelps Peter, opening the backseat door right into the carpark and hollering as a car zooms up to promptly park in the adjacent spot. Peter, in turn, clambers right back inside and slams it shut.

“Forget the doors, get out the bloody boot now I have it open!”

“Pete, I said to get the fucking nuggets — buggering fuck, I’ll get ‘em myself.”

Peter wails mid-scoot because James grabs him by the foot to drag him out of the boot.

“I — oh, shit I’m spilling all my nuggets.”

“Leave them.”

“I can’t _leave_ my _nugs!_ ”

“There will be others, Ben.”

“You really don’t know that, mate.”

“ _Ow_ — was that your fucking elbow?”

Then the boot slams shut and Sirius is left in silence with the scent of fast food lingering in the air. He sits up, peering out the window to watch his friends stumble _back_ into McDonald’s, casting less-than-surreptitious glances toward the car.

Remus raps his knuckles on said window.

Sirius’ chest deflates. But Remus’ smile is sweet and his jumper is a mustard colour that flatters his skin tone and rolls warmly at the neck and he’s waving at Sirius. Though he can’t smile, Sirius does reach over across the driver’s seat to press the button to lower the window.

“Hi,” greets Remus, perhaps breathing heavy. His chest is heaving, at least.

Sirius says nothing, recoiling back into his seat.

“It’s lucky, you know, that you texted me,” continues Remus.

Sirius curses his friends for getting him into this mess. Still, he says, “Why’s that?”

“Because.” Remus folds his arms over the window. “I was just robbing a bank two blocks from here. And I needed a getaway car.”

Sirius drums his fingers against the door. Without meeting Remus’ eyes, he extends his arm to open the driver’s side door and jab at it just enough so Remus can open it fully. Remus takes this as an invitation to climb in and sit beside Sirius, whose eyes flicker out the window, to the ceiling, the dashboard.

“Poor choice for a getaway car,” murmurs Sirius. “You’ll have to drive it yourself, because I can’t.”

“You can’t drive?” Remus shuts the door. There’s a smile in his voice.

“Never learned,” Sirius says blankly, folding his arms across his chest. His phone vibrates on the console.

**_Benjy: what’s he saying??????_ **

“Can’t swim, can’t drive.” Remus buckles in, turns the key in the ignition. “Can you do anything?”

Sirius only thinks _oh shit_ when Remus pulls away from the kerb. They’re at the nearest stoplight, then, when Sirius receives a round of texts:

**_James: HOOOLYYYYYSXCVKJ_ **

**_James: WHERE ARE U GOING_ **

**_Benjy: SIRIUS_ **

**_Benjy: actually_ **

**_Benjy: fuck it_ **

**_Benjy: just make him promise he’ll pay for it if he fucks up the car_ **

“My mate says you need to promise you’ll pay for it if you fuck up the car.” Sirius glances Remus’ way out of the corner of his eye.

Remus chuckles. “Alright, yeah. I promise.”

Sirius lays his head to the window. Then he abruptly straightens and pins his eyes on Remus. “Did you just call me useless?”

The corner of Remus’ mouth lifts.

“Oh,” says Sirius mock-thoughtfully. “Right. Because you can drive… presumably you can swim, too. And you can knot a cherry stem with your tongue. Is there anything you _can’t_ do, Jack of All Trades?” He rolls his eyes to the window. _‘Be a decent fucking person’ might not make the list_.

“Master of none.” Remus has one hand on the wheel. He leans his other elbow into the console, arching toward Sirius and whispering, “Can I tell you something? _Technically_ , though, I can’t drive either.”

Sirius looks between Remus and the road. “Sorry?”

Remus, thankfully, _doesn’t_ look away from the road, which is only mildly reassuring after his confession. He does keep half-smiling. At times, Sirius doesn’t think there’s anything that can keep Remus from _Half-Smiling_.

“You don’t have your licence?”

“I failed the test. Knocked over a traffic cone.”

Not sensing any imminent car-accident-danger, Sirius snorts a mirthless laugh and folds his arms across his chest. “Please don’t kill me.” He kicks his legs onto the dashboard, boots settling heavily.

Sirius has always liked sitting in cars. Not driving them — his mother would’ve never allowed it — but sitting and watching the world go by. The fact that it’s the only place Sirius won’t go stir-crazy sitting in stillness for too long is a conundrum in itself.

They’re skirting the border of Hyde Park when Sirius — concerned on the surface but too muddled and riddled with other questions inside to truly care — thinks to ask, “Where the hell are you going?”

“We,” Remus corrects calmly. “I wanted to show you a place, remember? We’re going to that place.”

Sirius thinks of the last time he truly spoke to Remus, in the corridor outside the Computer Science classroom. He loops his arms around his knees, low enough in the seat now that only the treetops blur past the window in painted streaks of orange and yellow. “You would’ve driven?” He considers reaching for the radio, then doesn’t.

Remus chuckles. “No. Some myriad of tube routes and buses, more like.”

Sirius just breathes a while. And in the moment, he doesn’t like Remus one bit, but he’s also ignoring his friends’ messages and willingly letting himself be kidnapped, so what does that say about him?

“It’s nice in the daytime,” Remus is saying. Sirius shrugs out of his jacket so he can bundle it up between his cheek and the door. “But I think it’s better once the sun has set.”

Sirius shuts his eyes.

**FRIDAY 18:19**

It’s when the rumble of the car cuts short that Sirius sits up with a start, leather jacket unsticking from his cheek and slipping into the crack between seat and door. Remus is climbing out of the car, and he smiles, his skin a pale-orange in the dusk, as he says, “I just need to pay for parking. Stay here.”

Sirius rubs at his eyes, picking the sleep from their corners. He’s only been out for a half hour, according to his phone — nobody’s texted in the group since Benjy’s last message — and the sun is amidst its set, reflecting on a dark-blue lake Sirius can see glimmer through the trees lining the car park. Cars are scattered around the park, the nearest four spots away.

Remus gets back inside. He leaves the door hanging open while he lights a cigarette.

Sirius, feeling like a disgruntled child woken up from his nap, asks in very much a childlike grumble, “Where are we?”

“Ruislip Lido.”

“What?” Sirius groans. The lake only makes sense then. He unfastens his seatbelt and stretches his arms above his head, hands thumping against the car’s ceiling. “Why?”

“Less light pollution. Can see the stars.” There’s a sunroof on Benjy’s sister’s car; Remus reaches up to uncover it. The sky is still a splay of foggy pastel bleeding into ink.

Sirius shakes his head. The burning cherry of Remus’ cigarette endures as a spot of light in his vision. “Alright, that’s nice. Can you take me home?”

Remus lowers the cigarette from his mouth. After a second, he laughs, tinged with amusement. “No?”

“Remus —”

“I wanted to talk.” He shifts in his seat, leaning into the console between them. “About what you said.”

Sirius’ lips curl menacingly. “About leaving me the fuck alone with those stupid notes?”

Remus’ lips thin. He pulls on the cigarette, taps the console a few times with absent impatience, then sighs out a puff of smoke. “If I wasn’t interested.”

Sirius rolls his eyes, pressing himself the furthest he can from Remus.

“That’s what you said,” Remus states, voice on the edge of a growl. “And I am.”

“In _me?_ ” Sirius rubs a hand across his eyes and leaves it there. He’d rather not see anything right now. “I think you’re mistaken, mate, because — because not even a couple weeks ago, you seemed awfully interested in fucking Ros’ mouth with your tongue.” Sirius lolls his head against the window. “Which is fine, which is just great. You seem happy together, and I don’t want to come between you. All I ask is that you leave me out of it. Leave notes for her instead, maybe. I’m willing to orphan the stupid fucking language.”

Remus holds his hand out the open door to tap the end of his cigarette. “It’s not that easy.”

Sirius laughs incredulously, fingers curling into a fist. His eyes go out of focus on the distant gleam of the lake’s surface. “It really is!”

“It’s not.” Remus breathes out shakily, drops the cigarette outside and shuts them into the car. Not into the stale, musty air — Remus must’ve cracked their windows while Sirius had been out. “Because since I met you, you’re all I’ve been able to think about,” he says adamantly.

Sirius drags nails through his scalp, counting mentally to ten but still halfway to hysterical. “Stop it,” he whispers.

“I’m not going to.”

From the corners of his eyes, Sirius can see that Remus has half his weight on the console now, fingers laced together, blue-green tendons bulging in the backs of his hands.

“Because if you were inside my head, you’d know, but you’re not.” Remus’ inhale is difficult to listen to. “So I can’t stop. I _have_ to keep telling you until you believe me.”

Sirius turns his head then, nostrils flared. Remus’ eyelashes cast feathered shadows onto his cheeks. “What if I don’t want to?” Sirius asks icily. He can feel the grind of his own teeth. “It would make trying to understand you _so_ much simpler if I choose not to believe you.” _Because then I wouldn’t want to understand you. And I could just forget._

Remus’ hand lifts. Sirius gaze remains steady. Yet, however hard he tries, Sirius twitches when they first make contact; fingertips draw a clockwise circle onto his cheek. His forefinger tip catches in the dip below Sirius’ cheekbone.

Sirius blames himself when he doesn’t turn his head away. He can only blame himself; Remus gives him plenty of time to escape with the way he moves so close yet so slowly, fingers tracing aimless and gentle over Sirius’ jaw, thumb dipping into the cleft of Sirius’ chin, breath dancing against his lips. He even has time to watch Remus’ eyes come to a soft close, the way one shuts a door when they’re trying to not wake anyone. And it’s a mere peck, a soft press of mouth to mouth, and Sirius feels Remus’ nose dent his cheek and though he can’t taste him he tastes the deep, deep, warm, steady stream of breath that Remus sighs against his mouth.

Sirius runs his tongue over his lips as he draws back. He finds his fingers clenched around his own thighs. Remus’ lips are parted with that breath, he notices, as he sits back in his seat, head to the headrest, shoulders pinned to the leather seat.

He sees almost nothing now that night is falling, doesn’t know where to look as he asks, “You know you’re a headfuck, right?”

He feels Remus’ fingers paw at his bare elbow.

“I just —” Sirius swallows so hard he has to suck in a breath after. “I just want you to acknowledge you’ve got a problem. That you’re a headfuck, that you’re headfucking me. My head is split open. Brains are… brains everywhere.” His eyes flit to Remus. “Don’t laugh at me.”

But Remus’ head is cocked, his lips pressed hard together as if he’s trying not to smile but not trying so hard he’d want to hide it from Sirius. He hides certain things, but it’s never his amusement with Sirius. That’s always plain as day. Remus’ dark eyes are black holes of otherworldly substance that Sirius’ fingers might pass through should he try touching. And even still, Remus says nothing, just smiles in the tilted way of his.

“Christ,” says Sirius bluntly, looking away. He shoves his jacket from the gap between the door and seat, patting about in search of a lever. When he feels it between his fingers, he pulls, and unhurriedly, like it wants to be anywhere else but the reclined position, the seat back lowers.

“What are you doing?” questions Remus.

“Escaping.” Sirius glues his back to the seat, hand still wrapped around the lever. The lower he goes, the less he sees of the lake over the dashboard.

Remus hums like he understands, which he doesn’t. “From me?”

“Yes,” Sirius says emphatically. “Because you’re a headfuck.” Then the seat halts and Sirius has his eyes on the ceiling. The sky is on its way to indigo. And Remus was right — there’s a few stars blinking now, more appearing the longer he stares.

“I have long arms,” says Remus, chin propped against the backrest of his own seat. He isn’t wrong. “I can still reach you.”

“ _My_ , what long arms you have.” Sirius snorts and hugs himself. “Don’t try and distract me from the topic at hand, Mr. Big Bad Wolf. Admit you have a problem.”

Remus is moving. He mutters _ow_ when his head hits the ceiling of the car. “I’d rather just kiss you,” he says lightly, like he’s talking about the weather or hot cross buns on offer.

Sirius snorts loudly. “And headfuck me some more. See? Problem. _You_ have a — god, get off me!”

Remus settles over him, bracketing Sirius’ thighs with his knees in the tight space they now have to share.

Sirius hugs himself tighter. The wind blowing through the hair’s breadth that the window is open is cold. But his thighs are warm as Remus sits against them. “Who let you over here?” asks Sirius. It comes out far more humorous and raspy and far less infuriated than intended. He likes this boy very little.

_Very little._

Remus shrugs. He touches the hem of Sirius’ t-shirt, fiddling with the threadbare material. “The door was open so I just.” Another shrug, and then he peels his jacket off, tosses it into the driver’s seat. “Came in.”

Sirius holds his breath.

Remus smiles. Then puts his weight on his knees again, hands settling on the seat above Sirius’ shoulders. “They ought to teach you not to leave it open —”

“Lest creepy men come sit on me?”

Remus’ laugh is the eye-crinkling kind. He touches Sirius’ chin, squeezes there gently. Sirius’ hands are still idle at his sides.

“Don’t talk about creepy men,” Remus whispers, “while I’m literally mounting you.”

Sirius grins. Remus’ fingers squeeze harder. “But there’s a creepy man mounting me, what else am I supposed to do?” Sirius mutters. It grows harder and harder to sound coherent now Remus has moved to thumbing his lower lip. “Except,” Sirius says softly, knuckles brushing against Remus’ stomach through his jumper, “except creepy men don’t wear jumpers from Topman, so this is all rather confusing.”

Remus’ forehead touches his own and even the breathless quiver of his laugh is loud in Sirius’ ears. “It’s not fucking Topman, you shit.”

Sirius tilts up his chin and pastes his palm flat to Remus’ tummy, feeling the inward-outward of his breaths and reveling in them. Remus kisses him finally, like he’d said he’d like to, and Sirius, with his lips falling apart for Remus’ tongue, wonders how he thought it would ever end as anything other than this.

While Remus’ tongue explores his mouth, Sirius’ hands wander the overheating skin under Remus’ jumper, fingernail scraping over his navel, thumb dragging against the grain of the trail of hair below. He makes a lost noise into Remus’ mouth and feels fingers grasp his hair as if in response.

Remus is thin but when he bends like this, up on his knees and looming over Sirius, his tight, tight jeans cut into his stomach and Sirius can feel it so he cranes both his hands down to unhook the button, the zipper, and Remus is _panting_ now and that wasn’t Sirius’ intention but still it’s got him hot from cheeks to chest and further, so hot he can’t do a thing when his leg jerks beneath Remus and he claws for purchase at the skin at both halves of his back.

Their lips are messy and wet when they part — Sirius feels saliva drip to his chin — because Remus is sitting back and dragging his yellow jumper over his head. He throws it into the boot. Sirius _hmm_ s, rubbing a less-than-discreet palm across his own nipple, still with his shirt in between.

“You need,” says Remus, thoroughly distracted now as he moves about, bumping his head again on the ceiling. Sirius doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing now but he doesn’t ask and just lets him, if only because he gets to watch the contractions of the muscles in Remus’ shoulders as he does.

Fingers unlace his boots. Then Remus grunts as he tries to pull one off. Sirius has to help, tugging his leg one way as Remus wiggles the boot in the other. It’s a process that happens twice, perhaps frustrating Remus but only leaving Sirius gleefully amused. Then Remus takes his socks off, too; when he does this he’s seated between Sirius’ legs, facing the windshield like one should when they sit in a car. He takes Sirius’ leg by the ankle, bends it back enough that he can kiss the top of his foot.

“Creep,” says Sirius, which is a mistake. He gets tickled in retaliation.

But now Remus is back on his knees — dangerously close to, again, hitting his head, but he spreads Sirius’ legs at the knees, hikes them over his hips, pressing down so their torsos are aligned, greeting him again with a kiss to the side of his neck.

Sirius gets to hug the full span of Remus’ shoulders and there’s friction everywhere but where he needs it — the insides of his forearms drag against the sweat on Remus’ naked back, the backs of his thighs against Remus’, both unfairly clothed. But Remus’ groin is against his arse and Sirius can feel he’s hard but Remus can’t feel that Sirius is, but he is which is also unfair, _unfair unfair unfair_. He keens as Remus bites his neck — Sirius can feel all the canines, could count them should he want to — and then, as if they speak in noises only and Remus knows, Remus slides his hand, slowly slowly down Sirius’ body to palm at his crotch.

“If you knew how you sounded,” murmurs Remus. He turns his head then so his forehead fits in the contour of Sirius’ temple, breath hot and damp against Sirius’ cheekbone.

Sirius thinks, _I’d probably sew my mouth shut_ , but then Remus’ strong fingers trace the outline of Sirius’ cock in his jeans and he thinks instead, _Take them off, take it all off me_.

Remus doesn’t, though his breathing picks up and he draws back, eyes alight in the dark. If Sirius looks past the untamed curls of his hair and through the sunroof, it doesn’t look much different, the darkness and shimmer.

“How much do you want me?” asks Remus, nuzzling his nose to Sirius’.

“I.” Sirius breathes heavily. Remus’ hand feels the shape of him. “I — I don’t think _want_ is quantifiable.”

Remus’ chuckle is a whisper. Then he grinds his hips just so, just until Sirius’ bum lifts fully from the seat and he’s able to grope him there, squeeze at half his arse. Maybe Sirius whimpers.

Remus kisses his open mouth, teeth catching on his lower lip. “How much do you trust me?”

 _Not much, but_. Again, “I don’t think —”

“On a scale of one to you’ll let me put my fingers in you?”

Instinctively, Sirius’ hole clenches a bit. He feels it, feels it the same as he can feel the flutter in his stomach. He can’t verbalise, so he just nods, quick, then quicker. _The highest. The highest number_.

Remus’ smile is a flash of teeth. 

Then Sirius is alone in the front seat. He tips his head back; Remus has climbed into the boot. He’s unrolling a sleeping bag, spreading it across the expanse of the boot. Another goes on top.

“Come on.” Remus waves him over — hair wild, sweat shining in white moonlight patches on his skin, jeans unbuttoned but still on. Sirius squirms onto his stomach first, balling his hand into a fist and laying his chin atop it as he looks at Remus, up and down and up again, until Remus smiles and says, “Come _on_.”

Sirius tumbles into the back, hunches so he can knee-walk toward Remus. “I like it when you’re impatient.”

Remus takes him by the cheeks and Sirius must like it a lot because his smile stretches wide. “You make me _very_ impatient,” he whispers.

Sirius’ eyes glide shut as Remus pecks his lips once, and again, petting thumbs into the hollows of his cheeks and shifting close enough to urge Sirius down onto his bum, onto his back. The layers of sleeping bag are cushy underneath him and the first thing he does is pull off his shirt while Remus watches. It means his hair falls in inelegant tresses across his face that he has to brush away, but once he does Remus is there, between his legs and unbuttoning Sirius’ jeans. Remus gets the fun job of peeling them off Sirius’ legs, and Sirius likes watching. He slides a hand down the front of his boxers.

“Don’t,” says Remus, not sharply but also not quietly. He takes Sirius’ hand by the wrist, kisses the palm that’d just touched his cock — _Jesus_ , Sirius goes lightheaded — then lays it against Sirius’ stomach. “You’ll come too fast.”

Sirius’ fingernails bite into the skin of his stomach. His eyes roll back a little. Otherwise he doesn’t move.

Remus gives no prelude to stripping Sirius of his pants, too.

The bottoms of Sirius’ feet thump softly against the cushioned floor. “You know I’ve never —”

Remus nods. He strokes his warm palms over Sirius’ knees, then shifts to be on all fours above him. “The girls who came before me,” he murmurs quietly, and the curl of his lips is dirty, “really, really missed out.”

Sirius rolls his eyes. He’s nervous but not scared, and gets on his elbows so he can kiss Remus, not expecting Remus to pin him to the floor with a hand to the middle of his chest.

“Stay down,” Remus mumbles.

Sirius watches him with his lips apart. He’s laid completely bare. He bats his eyes at Remus and spreads his legs.

“Fuck,” exhales Remus, fingers tapping once against Sirius’ chest before drawing away. “Eyes on mine,” he breathes belatedly, and Sirius is smirking until he sees Remus pull from his back pocket what must be a sachet of lube. He’ll make fun of him for it later — _do you carry those everywhere?_ — but he can’t even muster a voice now, feeling the weight of his cock against his stomach. “Only mine.”

Sirius reaches to touch the downy hair at the back of Remus’ neck. Remus’ eyes flick to his own at the touch, so so fast. And it isn’t cold when Remus’ careful, calloused fingers graze between his legs, behind his bollocks — Sirius can only see the movement of his shoulder as he does so — perhaps because Remus is so warm, it’s been in Remus’ pocket all this time. _So warm_. He nods encouragingly, not breaking his promise, trying hard to keep his eyes wide and open and on Remus even as he disobeys the _stay down_ rule to tongue over Remus’ nipple because it’s right there.

Remus pets his fingertip over Sirius’ hole, wetting the hair around it, stroking at it again, then pressing just his fingertip in. It’s so much, there’s so much lube, Remus is _so_ careful. 

“Down,” breathes Remus, because one hand’s busy between Sirius’ legs and the other is holding him up, so sluggishly Sirius complies, his nerves melting away into the pools of hot, dark intensity of Remus’ eyes and the sky the cover of the car. His head is heaviest to lay down, and he breathes in shallow breaths, quiet, soft, stroking circles over Remus’ shoulders as he tries to numb his mind enough to _relax_.

Sirius doesn’t miss the twitch of Remus’ lips when his finger slides in easier. It’s simultaneously the strangest thing Sirius has ever felt while also not being unexpected; though it feels new, he’d known he’d latently wanted it, suppressed the thought until Remus had asked him: _on a scale of one to…_

“Oh,” breathes Sirius. Remus was slow, now he’s not, fucking Sirius with that one, long finger. “ _Remus_.”

“Look at me,” Remus mumbles. Sirius does, forgetting to breathe. Remus bites his lip, then bites his own shoulder where it’s arched up close by his face like a lioness’. He groans and it makes Sirius’ cock twitch and he digs nails into Remus’ shoulders.

With a second finger Remus takes him apart. Sirius thinks he’s never been as vocal as he is now but then again, he’d never done much to begin with and Remus is unlocking doors he hadn’t known he’d had. He’s vaguely terrified they’ll be arrested for public misconduct but the car park is silent and Remus’ shoulders only grow slicker with sweat under his fingertips and when Remus tries to add a third finger he stops and sits back to lube up his fingers again and Sirius feels empty as he twists around his finger a lock of hair that hangs limp in front of Remus’ eyes.

Remus spreads his two fingers inside Sirius, deep again and again until Sirius has to ask him for the third. Remus lowers himself down to kiss by Sirius’ eye, the middle of his cheek, the corner of his mouth as he says, “Please,” and draws him in so tight Remus nearly collapses onto him but Sirius wouldn’t mind it that much, he doesn’t think.

Sirius’ legs are splayed completely once he’s got three fingers in him, squirming against the cushioned floor, panting with reckless abandon, until Remus smiles at him and says, “You can touch yourself now,” and Sirius gets a hand around his leaking cock. He sees nothing but Remus and makes sure Remus feels nothing but him as he tightens around his fingers and gasps, high and choked, over a headrush that spreads in electric lightning gossamer strands down his body as he comes across his stomach.

He doesn’t want to know how fast.

Remus pets the hair from Sirius’ eyes. The lube Remus wipes off all over… Benjy’s sister’s sleeping bag. _Christ_.

“If you only knew how you sounded,” Remus mutters again, collapsing beside Sirius but stroking greedily still over his bum and thighs as he settles.

“I’d sew my mouth shut, probably.” Sirius’ head lolls to look at Remus, the curve of whose shoulder is bathed in milky-pale moonlight.

“Don’t,” mumbles Remus, pinching at Sirius’ lower lip. _Not with the hand that’s been in my arse_. Sirius grins at the thought and Remus smiles back, unknowing. “I like it too much. Even when you’re pouty.”

Kissing Remus while still swimming through his hazy high is something Sirius decides he likes a lot.

Even if he decided earlier that evening that he didn’t like Remus much at all.

 _I don’t like you_ , he thinks laughably, foolishly as he withdraws from Remus’ lips with a soft smack. More like: _I don’t like you? Blatant question mark? How do you crumble my resolve like this?_

“That was interesting,” remarks Sirius, their noses an inch apart. He walks fingers downward from Remus’ navel.

“Hm?” Remus caresses his cheek until he finds a steady enough grasp to hold him by jaw.

“The whole eye-contact thing.” Sirius quirks a brow. “Where did that come from?” He snaps gently at the waistband of Remus’ pants, peeking from between the unzippered fly of his jeans.

Sirius can’t see colour beyond blue-black-gray but he suspects Remus might be blushing, just from the sound of his voice. “Dunno,” murmurs Remus. His stomach tenses under Sirius’ fingertips, relaxes when he gets used to the touch. Sirius wants to kiss that lower bit of his stomach, _there_ in particular, but he quite likes being eye-level with Remus so his words don’t have to travel so far. “Like seeing you. I want to know you’re there. And I want you to know I’m here.”

Sirius lifts his brow. “Okay.”

“Fuck you.” Remus says it so softly it sounds kind.

Sirius decides it’s time to bat his eyes again. “Well —”

“Fuck,” Remus swears, fiercer this time as he laughs with disbelief. “No, not yet. Not yet. Though, if you have a hand to spare, I’d appreciate some help. That is, if you want to be driven back at all.”

Sirius’ _hand to spare_ has been in Remus’ pants for some time, which he thinks is rather funny as he rubs his palm down the hot length of Remus’ cock. “Or we could take apart Benjy’s sister’s car and construct a shack out of it on the banks of Ruislip Lido and never leave.”

Remus presses a hand across his eyes. It doesn’t help to muffle his groan.

Sirius smiles wickedly. 

“You’re the engineer — _oh_.”


	8. The first lady of the Wembley IKEA

**SATURDAY 10:50**

Sirius rolls over and the mattress beside him is empty, not even a note this time.

He closes his eyes, pulls the body-heat-warmed blanket up to his ears. Last night, after he'd gotten Remus off — the pit of Sirius' stomach coils warmly at the memory of laying half-underneath Remus, watching his face for every hiss of breath and every bob of his Adam's apple as he'd stroked him fast and desperate — they'd driven to Benjy's house, sunroof and windows open, Sirius with his arm and head dangling out the window in the rushing, cool night air like a dog. Throwing the keys in Benjy’s mailbox and stealing away with the sleeping bag they'd soiled, they'd stumbled onto the Tube. Remus kept the sleeping bag tucked under one arm, and Sirius didn't let go of his other hand all night.

And Remus had been there beside him, naked and swaddled in Sirius' blanket, when his eyes had last been open.

Loud laughter echoes from the kitchen, Gil's at that wall-penetrating octave. Not that Sirius has walls around him, sleeping in the living room and all.

Sirius burrows deeper into his pillow. There's a crash, then, and only more laughter. As he hauls himself out of bed, he barely remembers to pull yesterday's underwear back on.

In the kitchen, Lily is at the table with a bowl of cereal. Gil leans against the edge of the table, dangerously close to her bowl, and _Remus_... Remus is opposite them, in a pair of Sirius' pyjama bottoms and his mustard jumper, two mandarin oranges in one hand, one in the other.

Sirius stills in the doorway.

“Good morning,” Gil purrs far too suggestively at the same time as Remus says, “You're up!” and approaches Sirius, mandarins and all, to take him by the cheeks — Sirius can feel the pebbled skin of the citrus against his face — and plant a kiss to his mouth.

Sirius is slack-mouthed and frozen when Remus pulls back with a hum. He doesn't like the way Lily's smirking as her spoon absently clinks against the inside of her bowl, and he doesn't dare make eye contact with Gil.

“What — what's happening in here?” he asks, clearing his throat halfway through his question.

When he looks at Lily, she holds up her hands and says, “I am but a victim. I got here first.” She grins. “Here I was, having my granola, and in comes _Remus_ , who, immediately upon seeing our fruit bowl, demands we have a juggle-off with the mandarins I bought yesterday.”

Sirius looks from Lily to Gil to Remus, who transfers all the mandarins into one hand to pick up an apple from the bowl and bite into it.

“Naturally, I can't bloody juggle, so I proposed Gil be my juggling proxy,” Lily says brightly, smacking Gil on the bum.

“It's a reasonable expectation given my skill with juggling balls in certain contexts,” mutters Gil deviously. Lily covers her eyes as she spoons cereal into her mouth. “But sorry to disappoint. I can't juggle mandarins. And —” Gil points an accusing finger at Remus — “neither can you, you fucking liar.”

Remus lifts a brow, setting the apple — too perfect in its red, waxy shine and hollow in its singular circular bite — on the countertop. “Now, let's not be disparaging of the self-taught, Gil,” murmurs Remus with a furrow to his brow. Then he turns to Sirius, as if to explain. “It's just that the first time, the ceiling lamp was in the way —” he nods upward at the bowl-shaped plastic lamp dangling now subtly off-kilter — “and the second time, I'd... I'd decided mid-juggle that I was aiming for the glass on the table.”

“The one that's now in shatters in the bin,” Lily contributes helpfully, and she's... not in a rage as Sirius might have expected, continuing to chew contentedly on her granola.

Sirius says nothing as he casts a glance toward the bin, unable to decide where he lies between bewildered and confused and relieved. Relieved that Remus hadn't rolled out of bed and went out his door not to be seen or heard from for days, weeks, right after they'd tumbled together the night prior and only further tangled the mess of questions lodged inside Sirius' head.

Then Sirius' eyes refocus because Lily squeals joyfully and Gil lifts his hand to warily shield half his face. Remus, with the pink tip of his tongue bitten between his teeth, is juggling the bloody mandarins. Before Sirius' eyes, the movement blurs into a graceful, continuous arc of orange until Remus, grinning, catches two in one hand and bows exaggeratedly for his audience of three.

While Lily claps and stomps her feet, Gil purses his lips until he shortly begrudges, sighing, “Okay, that was pretty damn good.”

Remus shrugs, drops two mandarins back in the fruit bowl and proceeds to peel the remaining one. “I’m good at many things.” Before Remus can do anything — shoot a wink at Sirius, perhaps, who’s still motionless in the doorway — Petunia charges into the kitchen, her bony shoulder colliding with Sirius’ when she passes him by. Her house slippers _clap clap_ against the floor as she strides to the fridge.

“Yes, we know, we _all_ heard how good you were last night,” she states priggishly.

Remus is unfazed and pops a mandarin segment into his mouth. Lily stifles a laugh against the back of her wrist, and Gil gapes, moving to Petunia’s side to touch a hand gently to the small of her back.

“ _Some_ one woke up on the wrong side of her memory foam mattress,” murmurs Gil. He looks at them all over his shoulder, suppressing a smile as he slides his arm around Petunia. “With her _satin_ sleep mask rather than her _silk_ one.”

Petunia swats him with the juice carton she’s holding. “I couldn’t have woken up if I never fell asleep.”

“Were we that loud?” asks Remus without pause, tearing apart the mandarin.

Lily abruptly bursts into laughter.

Sirius’ cheeks warm, glowing pink all the way up his forehead. He looks at his toes.

“I’ve changed my mind, I don’t want Sirius sleeping in the living room anymore,” Petunia whines, glass of grass-colored juice in hand. Gil gives a straight-lipped smile as he guides her from the kitchen, hollowly muttering, “There, there, Tuney.” Sirius might’ve felt a pang of relief at their exit did Gil not wink at him in passing.

Remus is disposing of the mandarin peel as Sirius fully steps into the kitchen for the first time that morning. His bare feet stick slightly to the cold tile and he hugs himself tigh. As Remus bends toward the bin, his jumper betrays a sliver of his very lower back.

“Evans,” Sirius says under his breath.

Lily’s teeth clink against her spoon as she bites on it. Her eyebrows lift expectantly, but Sirius speaks no further, and he thanks the heavens and the spirit of Kurt Cobain and whatever greater force controls the weather that Lily understands social cues. She picks up her bowl in one hand and the box of granola in the other and smiles cautiously while sidestepping him to leave.

Remus does a double-take when he notices Lily is gone. He turns in a full circle then before settling on a perch against the table’s edge, a second mandarin in hand. “I like your flatmates —”

“ _Why_ are you in here juggling at arse o’clock in the morning,” Sirius mutters, brows pinched.

Remus stops moving the fruit from one hand to the other. “It’s hardly arse o’clock, Sirius, it’s nearly noon.”

“I thought you’d left.”

Remus’ head tilts a bit. As he shrugs, the jumper stretches across his chest. “I just can’t sleep this late most of the time.”

“I thought,” Sirius says again, teeth gritted, “you’d _left_.”

He hates the way Remus blinks so owlishly, then averts his eyes as if he thinks he might slip away without explanation again.

But Sirius feels much more sober in the light of day with his own chilly floor under his feet. “No?” he mutters, far too on-par with a whisper. He coughs. “Nothing to say?”

Remus rolls the mandarin onto the table. Quietly, he starts, “I know —”

“Speak up, would you?”

Remus' eyes narrow marginally. Then he clears his throat. “I know where your head's at, that I'd be straight off to Ros' when I left here, but it's over. She and I, we're done,” he says louder, but slowly, like he's ticking off boxes — _exhibit your understanding. Explain the situation at hand. Don't provoke the frenzied animal._

Goosebumps prickle Sirius' arms. He tries to rub warmth into them, but all the heat he feels is in his head, a strange, angry, pulsing, _nervous_ impatience with Remus. “Forgive me,” he murmurs ostentatiously, and for a moment he sounds just like Regulus, “but I really, _really_ don't get how this is any different from before.”

Remus' mouth opens but Sirius plows over him.

“You said you and Ros were through and then I found you _in_ her flat, all over her like — like she was a lion in heat.” Sirius stares at the wall past Remus, frowning mock-thoughtfully. “Then again, if she was, I suppose I can't blame you. Phero — pheromones, and all. Chemical bloody reactions.”

Sirius doesn't look at Remus — or maybe he does, catches a peek of his concentrated expression as his eyes flicker his way — until Remus says, “You asking for the loo was simultaneously the funniest and most terrifying thing,” with a fucking smile.

Sirius snorts. “Oh, brilliant. Glad you found it amusing.” _Only nearly broke my friend's face in the aftermath_.

He's halfway to the door when Remus latches onto his arm. His hand is so warm that Sirius doesn't resist, only for that reason.

“Do you remember how long I'd said I'd dated Ros?” asks Remus.

Sirius does but he doesn't say so. He glares at a notch in the smooth paint on the door frame.

“Four years. And I've known her even longer.” Remus turns him gently so he can set his hands on Sirius' shoulders and, _okay, that's nice_ , rub his calloused palms up and down, up and down his biceps. “She knows me better than anyone. Anyone but me, of course. But the thing is, Sirius, that she thinks she's above that, too. That she knows me better than _me_.” Remus sighs and even that warms his skin. Sirius commits to mind the pattern on his own pyjamas on Remus' skinny legs. And meanwhile, Remus tucks Sirius' hair behind his ears, and Sirius lets him though he thinks it's a _don't_ somewhere in the _having long hair_ handbook, right next to _middle-parting your hair like Jesus_.

“Sometimes,” murmurs Remus, somewhere a few inches above in the ether Sirius has declared a no-man's land, “she's able to convince me of it, though. That she knows me better than me, that she knows what's best for me. She's... able to get into my head because she knows how I work.” He laughs softly. “Sometimes. And what she thought was best for me, Sirius, was that we get back together, that you didn't want anything serious with me. And I was an _idiot_ for letting her trick me.” His hands encompass Sirius' shoulders, then they slide up to his jaw, bracketing Sirius' face there. Then Remus plants an absent kiss to his forehead. “Now I'm just an idiot with one less girlfriend.”

Sirius isn't sure when his eyes closed, but he has to peel them open. He looks into the ether. Remus' face is close and clear-eyed. “One less than a starting count of…?”

Remus shrugs, thumbs brushing the downy hair by Sirius' ears. “I’m not sure. How many boyfriends have I got across all the alternate universes?” His lips purse in thought. “Perhaps we broke up after we won _Love Island_.”

Sirius tries to scowl. He fails. He bites his lip instead, pitching forward to nudge his forehead to Remus' cheek. Stubble brushes against Sirius' cheek, then Remus' lips. “How could you think I wouldn't want something serious?” he mumbles, then sighs out his nose, leaning back to look Remus in the eye. “If I wasn't Sirius, I'd have an identity crisis on my hands.”

The sight of Remus' half-smile drips pins and needles through Sirius' body from head to toe, leaving behind a pleasant, warm, numb feeling. Remus begins, “You —”

“Sorry. It's actually imperative that I make a joke whenever that word's said out loud, else this detector chip planted under my skin will self-destruct and blow me to pieces.”

Remus is bemused, but clearly not fooled.

“They implanted one in my arm. Part of a Robotics Society hazing thing.”

Remus is considerate, waits a few seconds for Sirius' joke to fizzle out into the air between them. Then he states, “I don't like your jokes,” lips curling up again. He runs the pad of his thumb over Sirius' lower lip.

Sirius scoffs. “Well, I don't fucking like yours, either. You _laughed_ when I found you sucking face —”

“I didn't _laugh_!” Remus chuckles, then links his arms fully around Sirius' neck.

Sirius squints at him, then at the mandarin on the table. For a few passing moments, he simply stands within the circle of Remus' arms. Then he says, “I’m cold.” He lifts his eyes, purposefully pulling at the elbow of Remus' yellow jumper with hinting fingers.

Remus hums. “Are you?” His arms sag off Sirius' shoulders, and Sirius waits patiently, but when Remus lifts the hem of his jumper, he also plunks his hand on top of Sirius' head and shoves him down low enough to lift the hem of the jumper over his head.

Sirius squawks, obviously. “This isn't what I meant!” he protests, muffled against Remus' chest, and the only way out, as far as he can tell, is to go up, squeeze his head out through the neck hole, all while colliding with Remus' chin rather painfully.

So there he stands, stretching Remus' mustard jumper to its physical limits, virtually no space between them. But he isn’t cold anymore.

Remus makes a noise like a satisfied hum against Sirius' cheek. “I like this.”

Sirius also speaks against Remus' cheek. “You were _supposed_ to be gentlemanly and give me your jumper.”

“You've never had a boyfriend before,” murmurs Remus calmly, hugging Sirius because his arms have free range. Sirius' don't, squeezed to his sides by tight knit. “Don't claim to know how these things work.”

Sirius snorts. Drops his cheek to Remus' shoulder. Resolutely doesn't comment on _boyfriend_ in fear that it was a slip of the tongue and his hopes might be torn to shreds. “You're fucking mad,” he sighs. But he gets to sigh against Remus' neck, warm the cold tip of his nose there. He doesn't dislike that.

Remus squirms, but Sirius doesn't move from his spot, weight against Remus. “It's harder to kiss you this way than I thought,” says Remus.

“Mm. If you'd warned me before you assaulted me —” Sirius did _not_ go along with it, certainly not — “I could've measured the circumference of the neck hole in advance and determined it's only big enough for both our necks without any wiggle room for snogging.”

Remus' teeth scrape the corner of his jaw, and there's a laughing undertone to his voice as he mutters, “I love it when you talk dirty to me.”

**TUESDAY 16:10**

For Sirius, it’s the awkward limbo between the end of class and the impromptu Robotics Society meeting he’d called that morning. Registration had opened that day for the coming spring’s competition. They’d placed the spring prior and the grant they’d won would cover most of the coming year’s expenses… much to Sirius’ fortune. He doesn’t want to be the VP who, on the day of the competition, can’t afford the travel or nightly stay and is forced to throw himself to the ground, crying _go on without me_ as the team totes their robot into the hired car.

He’s outside, standing in a semi-circle with James, Peter, and Benjy, mainly because Peter has to stand in the direction the wind’s blowing from while the others smoke and take care to blow it into the passing wind lest Peter’s mum blow her top off smelling the smoke on his skin and clothes.

“ _How_ does that not tempt you,” James asks blankly, pinching his cigarette in a manner he manages to make look spiteful. “ _Two fifty_ for a pint. Two! _Fifty!”_

Sirius just stares back, vaguely amused. “I have responsibilities, Jamison.”

“That couldn’t’ve waited until tomorrow’s _regularly scheduled meeting?”_ He’s getting rather feverish now about two-fifty pints, tips of his ears red not from the cold, but from frustration.

“If you knew anything about competitive edge —”

“Excuse me?! Competitive — who led our football team to —”

Benjy chimes in, “Whiff the victory of first place from the second pedestal?”

James holds his palm up to cover Benjy’s face. “— _near_ -victory in last year’s cup?!”

Sirius shrugs, takes another pull on his cigarette. “You did, but not by drinking the night before practice.”

James scowls at him, then gestures at Sirius from head to toe, shaking his head with incredulity. “Who are you? Who did this to you? What have you _become_ —”

“Robots first, then drinking,” Sirius reasons.

“What?! It’s supposed to be _James_ first, then bloody robots and drinking, are you —”

Benjy massages James’ shoulders. “Chill, mate. If Sirius would rather make excuses to go and build a sex robot, can you really blame him?” Benjy perches his chin on James’ shoulder. “You can’t give the man what he needs.”

James’ fury is fleeting, because a devilish smile overcomes his face. It unsettles Sirius. “I know someone who can.”

“Hey.” Hands clamp over Sirius’ shoulders, not quite the way Benjy’s are on James’, though.

Sirius turns abruptly, finds himself face to face with Remus, autumn-eyed and zipped into a too-big bomber jacket. The cigarette butt falls out of Sirius’ fingers but the wind catches it on the uptake. “Hi,” he breathes.

Remus smirks knowingly down at him, then lifts his brows in greeting at the others.

_Oh. Common courtesy._

Sirius clears his throat, pointing at his friends in turn. “Er, there’s Peter, Benjy, and James. Lads, meet — meet Remus.”

Remus smiles at the chorus of mixed _whazzup-howsitgoinmate-hellos_ , which are, both to Sirius’ relief and concern, deceptively normal.

James grins and says, “We were just talking about how Sirius would rather fuck a robot than go for a piss-up with us this fine evening.”

_Ah, there it is._

Remus still has one hand on Sirius’ shoulder, which he squeezes. Sirius watches him thumb a rivet in the leather of his jacket.

Tamely, Remus nods and, tilting his head toward Sirius, murmurs, “Why are you fucking robots, love?”

Sirius rolls his eyes at the glint in Remus’ gaze.

Benjy snorts so loud he probably hacks something up. “I hope you’re joking right now, mate, ‘cos at the rate Sirius is going, he could totally use a sex ro —” Then Benjy falls silent. “Oh, holy _shit_. You’re Remus! _That_ Remus!”

Remus looks at Sirius a moment longer, his thumb rubbing circles into his shoulder, before he chuckles at Ben’s outburst. “Dammit, I thought I was the only one.”

“Only — oh, definitely the only Remus I’ve ever met, dude, but — shit, I didn’t fucking realise! You look different when…” Benjy rubs the back of his neck, coughs out the rest of the sentence, “When we’re not spying on you through a Maccies window.”

Remus’ lips purse into his half-smile. Then he reaches out, smacks Benjy on the shoulder. “Thanks for letting me jack your car, mate.”

Benjy touches his arm, where Remus’ hand had been, almost reverently. “Anytime! Anytime, man. And no worries about the sleeping bag, either, I just — I told my sister I spilt my milkshakes on it.” He shakes his head, bats a hand. “All good. You can keep it. Like, forever.”

James’ cringe ripples through his face. Peter stares up at Remus, who’s nearly a foot taller than him, with a look of silent appreciation. Then James claps his hands together. “Well, the two-fifty-a-pint happy hour’s only ’til six, so _we_ , us _well-adjusted_ homo sapiens who _want_ to get drunk for cheap and _don’t_ want to go back into school once it’s already over, should be going, then.”

“ _Cor blimey_ , guv, can’t you give it a rest?” Benjy thumps James on the back. “You forget, Jamie, that some of us have prospects, _real_ prospects. And if we don’t think about them now, then ten years along, we’ll still be jobless, living at mummy and daddy’s and writing _Jane Austen_ fan fiction on the daily.”

James sputters. “Robot competitions have nothing to do with Sirius’ prospects! And who are you to talk about prospects? _No one_ is going to let you cut into their heart, much less put a scalpel in your hand!”

Benjy’s eyes narrow. “We can discuss that over two fifty pints.”

James jabs a finger into Benjy’s shoulder. “ _Don’t_ talk about Austen like that.”

Benjy rolls his eyes. “Come on, mate, you could try writing about something normal, like…” He shrugs. “ _Star Trek_.” Then he looks in Sirius’ direction. “Anyway, you’re free Friday, yeah?”

Sirius is about to nod when Remus’ hand slips from his one shoulder to the other so now Sirius is nearly up against his side. “Actually,” Remus puts in — Sirius can feel the weight of his gaze on the side of his face, but instead of returning it, smiles to himself — “I was hoping I could have Sirius for Friday night.”

Sirius leans into his arm. He brings his cigarette to his lips again. If he breathes in deep enough, he can smell Remus through the cold and the smoke.

Benjy gapes momentarily and then says, “Well, shit, yeah, ‘course! Of course you can have him! Take him! All of him, all yours!”

James squints at Benjy. “Why have I got this feeling you’d literally give Remus all your money if he asked?”

Benjy pats his pockets for his wallet, then shoots Remus a look. “Please don’t ask me to.”

“I think Sirius gets to decide what he’s doing Friday night,” interjects Peter, shrugging with his hands in his jacket pockets.

Remus turns a furtive smile on him. “The voice of reason,” he says. “I like you.”

Briefly, Benjy appears hurt he doesn’t have Remus’ direct approval.

Sirius hums aloud in thought, a long _hmmm_ that has him glancing backward at Remus, at the quirk to his thin lips. “Sorry, lads,” he says, and James throws his hands into the air with a groan.

“Grow up,” intones Peter.

Sirius pulls Remus’ arm down across his chest, and Remus looks on the verge of genuinely apologising for James’ outburst, so Sirius tugs gently on Remus’ ring finger, chin tilted upward beckoningly. This isn’t anything he hasn’t already done in front of his friends — with girls, that is — and yet he’s overheating in the autumn air with scarcely two layers on, cigarette dangling from his fingers with suppressed trepidation.

Remus’ furrowed brow softens when he turns toward Sirius, looks between his eyes and lips. “Was there something you wanted?” he whispers, clearly going for casual, but the next breath he drags through his nose is heavier. A beat of thought, flickering clear eyes, and then, “Do you have any idea how sexy I find you?”

Sirius almost rolls his eyes halfway like _really? Did you just say that?_ but the words are coursing through his veins and thinning them, one by one, making it harder and harder for the blood to rush to his head. Biting his lip, he nudges the tips of their noses. “Very, I’d hope.”

“Damn, alright,” laughs Peter, maybe.

“Jamie, get his eyes,” hisses Benjy.

“Oh, please, I’ve seen far worse from the two of you,” scoffs Peter. “Where’s the pub we’re headed?”

James mutters, “I have it on my phone, just.” They sound as if they’re retreating, so Sirius looks offhandedly, rewarded with two thumbs up from Benjy and an uncharacteristically lascivious tongue-out-and-wink from Peter as they sideways-schlep toward the street. James, meanwhile, looks theatrically disgusted.

“Fuck off,” Sirius calls grinningly, tossing his cigarette and grabbing onto Remus’ shoulders when he trips backward over Remus’ foot, “Fuck _right_ off!”

Remus kisses the center of his cheek, tucks loose hair behind his ear, ropes him in by the waist. And they might in the middle of the schoolyard but Sirius has been all over Remus the past few minutes, anyone who’s wanted to see has seen. He smiles at Remus unabashedly, doesn’t care what it does to his face to look that way, and snakes his arms up so they fasten around his neck, getting on half-tip-toe just so he can murmur against Remus’ lips, “What are we doing Friday night?”

“Things,” answers Remus. His hand is in Sirius’ hair. “What’re you doing right now?”

“Robots.” Then he hesitates. “Not, like, _doing_ them, I’m not actually fucking them, don’t listen to a word Benjy says.”

“Good. Save yourself for Friday.”

Sirius’ brows shoot up. Remus is all brows and lashes in his vision, fuzzy with closeness. “ _What_ does that mean?”

“Nothing. Just that I’d like to shag you without thinking about wires and circuit boards up your arse.”

Sirius’ nose wrinkles then. “Fitting time to leave for my meeting,” he mutters, lowering himself onto flat feet, though his eyes remain on Remus’ lips. “Any shreds of arousal I had are just —” he swipes the air with his hand — “gone.”

Remus says nothing. Then he releases Sirius’ waist to palm his face instead, kiss him soft. Sirius’ knees give out, and after Remus draws back, he chases after him, but all Remus does is extricate himself from Sirius’ hold and tactically avoid kissing him back.

“Friday,” Remus says.

Sirius rolls his eyes, swipes his bag from the cold ground. “I’m leaving.”

It’s just as he’s reaching the doors of the school that footsteps echo on hard concrete behind him and Remus grasps his shoulder and says, “Don’t walk away from me like that, Sirius,” into his ear like a breath.

Sirius’ face splits into a grin that he has to tamper when he turns toward Remus, rucksack dangling off his shoulder, nose raised indifferently.

But it takes seconds for Remus’ knowing smile to break him and next Sirius knows his bag’s sagged to the ground and he’s up against the wall with Remus’ hands down the back pockets of his jeans and his tongue in his mouth.

Sirius’ phone starts to vibrate in his pocket, then, and Remus, curling his tongue into Sirius’, pulls away with obscenely red lips and a noise like a suction cup. “Who’s calling you?”

Sirius pets at his cheek, trying to coax him in again, breathes, “Spam. People trying to give me a free holiday if I buy a timeshare. Just ignore it.”

“Can’t well cop a feel of your arse if your phone’s buzzing in there,” answers Remus, evading Sirius’ lips again. So he pulls the phone out and holds it immediately to his ear. “Hello, this is Sirius Black and I’m keenly interested in your Maldives timeshares.”

Sirius’ eyes roll back in his head. He rubs his thumb over a dark freckle on Remus’ neck, then kisses it. A tinny, feminine voice echoes vaguely through the speaker.

“Why can’t you ever take a fucking hint?” Remus hisses then, taking a step back from the wall. “ _Don’t_ call him again. Your number will be blocked.” Remus lowers the phone, staring murderously at the screen as he, presumably, blocks the number.

“Jesus.” Sirius snorts. “I didn’t know you felt so strongly about timeshares.”

“It was Ros,” Remus mutters, handing Sirius back his phone.

Sirius blinks. “What?”

Remus only lifts Sirius’ bag from the ground.

Sirius doesn’t move, only balks. “How did she get my number? Why was she calling me?” 

“She’s trying to trick you, poison your mind the same way she did mine.” Remus fully zips one of the half-open pouches on Sirius’ rucksack, then presses it into Sirius’ chest. “Just forget it. Forget about her, everything’s easier if you do.” Remus kisses his cheek quickly before he takes off toward the street.

Sirius is left standing by the school doors, phone in one hand and bag dangling from the other.

**THURSDAY 14:20**

Sirius stares at the string of numbers in his recent calls list. Ros’ phone number. Which Remus had blocked.

He rests his chin on his knees, thumb hovering over the number until a notification rolls into sight at the top of his screen.

**_Regulus: Hey_ **

**_Regulus: So I have this recital coming up at school_ **

**_Regulus: For piano_ **

**_Regulus: It’s next Friday evening_ **

**_Regulus: If you want to come_ **

Sirius feels a further tug at the corners of his lips when the next, and next, and next messages roll in.

“I know men have this misconception that power is just something inherent to their gender, like, something they don’t need to earn or deserve because they’re born with it, but this is _not_ what I meant when I said we needed your manpower,” says Lily, gesturing a gloved hand at Sirius.

He’s sitting and smoking on an upturned bucket by a torn-open bag of soil, which doesn’t look good if he means to argue back. He doesn’t.

He’s out back by the greenhouse with Lily, Mary, Marlene, and Amaline, all of whom are, in one way or another, smudged with dirt and garden-gloved and clutching trowels or seed packets. The Headteacher had approached Mary about the stagnancy of the greenhouse and its grounds, after which she’d promptly bought — with the remains of the club budget — a few measly potted trees to shove into the greenhouse, seeds, trowels and shovels. And soil. Several sacks of soil.

Mary huffs, leaning into her shovel, already in a state of disgruntlement at the brown dusting of earth on her white tennis shoes. “Lily, not _all_ men —”

“I wouldn’t finish that sentence,” Amaline warns, throwing her trowel to the ground. “Sirius, get over here and plant the —” She squints at the seed packet — “Kohlrabi.”

“Sorry.” Sirius pockets his phone, perhaps less-than-helpfully drops his cigarette into the soil, and hauls himself to his feet. He’s standing beside Amaline when he asks, “Do I get gloves, too?”

She gives him a blank look, then peels her own off, shoves them into his hands with the seeds, and goes to take a seat on his unoccupied bucket, zipping up her jacket.

Sirius tears open the sachet, examining Amaline’s neatly-dug row of holes. He upends the sachet into the first hole, then squints over at Amaline. “Have we got any more Kohlrabi seeds?”

She shakes her head.

Sirius grimaces at his seed pile.

“You did it wrong,” Marlene says from behind him, and Sirius, perched in an unstable squat, goes tumbling so his each of his knees slips into a ditch. It’s only bad because his jeans have rips in both knees.

Still with his knees swallowed by the ground, he gives himself whiplash looking back at Marlene. “This is your doing,” he grumbles, nose wrinkling as he his hands sink into the soil in the effort to literally unearth himself.

Marlene only smiles, her black lipstick worn off at the corners of her mouth. “So, Black.”

“What.” Sirius tries to brush off his knees but the soil leaves behind pungent, dark tracks.

“You’re gay.”

Sirius stares straight ahead at his reflection in the greenhouse windows. Frowns at the image of Marlene there beside him, her massive red Dr. Martens. “Yeah?”

Marlene lifts a severely arched brow. “You don’t sound so sure.”

“ _Fucking_ — yes, I’m gay.”

“So I can ask out Dorcas?”

Sirius’ cough is half-laugh. “You’re still on about that threesome?”

“Actually, Gid and I are on an amicable break.”

Sirius just takes her in, face pinched. “You don’t even know if she’s into girls.”

Marlene only snorts. “Only one way to find out.” When Sirius’ eyes widen slightly, she smirks and says, “By asking her out, twat. Anyhow, if there ever was a time, it’s now, seeing as you’ve so recently and graciously ruined men in her eyes.”

Sirius’ mouth is open in a small ‘o’. Then he pinches seeds from the mound in one hole to redistribute them. “You’re welcome,” he mutters.

Marlene smiles. “Pleasure doing business with you.”

Once he’s shaken her off, Sirius shakes off his gloves, too, to retrieve his phone.

**_Sirius: i’ll be there_ **

**_Sirius: and I’ll bring my boyfriend :)_ **

**FRIDAY 19:03**

Remus has a picnic basket dangling from his one elbow, a joint tucked behind each ear, and Sirius’ hand clasped in his own. They’ve been walking for fifteen minutes now, mostly in silence. Darkness has fallen and only Remus’ hand is keeping Sirius warm.

“How much further?” asks Sirius.

“Impatient, are we?” Remus doesn’t look at Sirius but his mouth still quirks.

“You’re acting suspicious,” answers Sirius, eyes skating absently over the lit display cases of a closed luxury jewelry store, setting the street aglow. “What did you steal-slash-is it in that basket?”

“You only get three questions a night. Careful how you use them.”

“ _Three —?_ What are you, a genie? _I wish_ we’d get to the secret destination already.” Then Sirius is jerked backward because Remus has frozen.

“Wish granted,” murmurs Remus. He then presses the basket into Sirius’ arms — unexpectedly light — and pulls a key from his pocket.

Sirius takes a step toward the quiet street to squint at the sign above the doors at which Remus is busying himself. _“Harvey’s Furniture Village?”_ he reads, then looks down to find Remus on his knees inside the now-open glass doorway, keying a padlock on the roller shutters, the next layer of protection between them and… Harvey? Sirius laughs slightly in disbelief as Remus pockets the padlock and pushes up the shutter door. “Remus, what the _hell_ —”

“My uncle owns it,” Remus says as he stands. He cocks his head at Sirius, extending his palm toward him, wriggling his fingers as if they’re screaming _hold me_. “He gave me the keys. Don’t make that face.”

“Harvey Lupin?” Sirius mutters skeptically. A corner of the picnic basket digs into his stomach as he steps toward Remus. “Even if that was all well and good and I believed you, it still begs the question _why are we here_.”

Remus’ eye-roll is astoundingly exaggerated and yet he’s grinning as he takes Sirius by the shoulders and shepherds him inside. “That’s the first of your three questions. I had this dream, when I was little, that someday I’d get to live in _IKEA_. I’d have everything I’d ever need in there. Fifty beds — could alternate which one I slept in every night — a ball pit, Swedish meatballs galore.”

Sirius turns around with his eyebrows raised to watch Remus shut the door, roll down the shutter door again. They’re surrounded by a selection of ugly antique chairs upholstered in florals.

“But gaining access to _IKEA_ Wembley is, by several magnitudes, more difficult than asking Uncle Harvey for the keys to his shop,” Remus explains, palms pressed together gravely. He traipses toward Sirius, then lays their foreheads together. Sirius thinks he’s mental and wants to kiss him anyway. “So until I rise up the corporate chain at _IKEA_ or acquire some sort of blackmail on the site manager, this will have to do.”

Sirius licks his lips, feeling himself smile despite the bizarreness of it all. “I’ve just decided that I’d love to be the first lady of the Wembley _IKEA_ ,” he murmurs.

Remus takes him by the cheeks. “I’ve just decided that I’m changing my career trajectory.”

“Or you could be the first man to direct films inside _IKEA_.”

“That’s a thought.” Remus smiles and smudges a kiss to the corner of Sirius’ mouth. “Now don’t be mad, but this isn’t the secret destination just yet.”

Sirius tuts his tongue and groans, swiveling so Remus can steer him again. “Does Harvey have an apocalypse bunker under his furniture village?” Remus presses on the backs of his shoulders. Sirius adjusts the slipping basket in his arms. “It wouldn’t have been my first choice for a Friday night, but I think we could make it...”

Remus sweeps aside a curtain.

“… work.”

Sirius is close to adding _pyromaniac_ to his mental list of ways to describe Remus, but he realises quickly that flames can’t breathe in closed jars and the jarred, flickering tea lights scattered around the room must be battery-powered. Crammed in the space between a massive vase and a marble-topped side table is an electric fireplace, one of the gaudy ones with the obviously fake logs burning away inside, but it’s warmed the curtained-off space enough that Sirius’ cold fingers are prickling with blood flow. Amidst it all, a four-poster king bed, draped with a hideous canopy, has its curtains tied back, and while Sirius is still motionless and gaping, Remus steals the basket from his arms and gets a running start to leap onto the bed. Those joints he’d tucked behind his ears fall out onto the bed and he sets them gingerly on the nightstand. Then, he drapes his long body across the mattress, throws open the basket, and pulls out a bottle.

Scanning the label, Remus asks, “Can I interest you in…” then gives up on reading. “Six quid prosecco?”

Sirius takes a tentative forward step, slipping his jacket from his shoulders. “Remus.”

Remus doesn’t look away from Sirius, not for a moment. “Bottled in the Himalayas.”

Sirius’ eyes narrow, then. “I didn’t know they had vineyards in the Himalayas.”

Remus smirks. “They don’t, silly. They grow the grapes in Italy, or wherever, then haul the casks up the mountains for bottling.”

“And transport them to Asia in between.”

“And transport them to Asia in between,” confirms Remus.

Sirius hops onto the edge of the bed; the mattress is too high to simply sit down on. “Remus,” he mumbles again, hugging his jacket to his lap, “What have you done?”

Remus gets off the mattress, then, striding to the nearest cabinet. Sirius frowns when he opens the door and pulls out two long-stemmed glasses. Remus then smirks at him over his shoulder. “Don’t worry, I washed them. I just put them in here for effect.”

Sirius breathes out a soft laugh. His jacket falls to the floor because his hands don’t work anymore. He’s at a loss for breath and words.

“Duck,” Remus commands, and Sirius falls flat to his back against the mattress as Remus pops the cork on the prosecco.

It sails between the parallel posters of the bed like they’re goalposts, so Sirius then springs upright, arms in the air, hollering, “In the twenty-sixth minute, his forty-second goal of the season!”

Remus laughs brightly and spills prosecco absolutely everywhere trying to fill the flutes — on his jumper, the rug, the cabinet he’d stored the glasses in. He presses a flute so urgently into Sirius’ hands that it spills on him, too, but Remus just bats a hand. “We’ll get you out of those in a bit,” he mutters, then clinks their glasses. “But right now, we must toast.”

Sirius licks his fingers where the prosecco’s run down them, then lifts his eyes to Remus’. “Mmm. Right, toast.”

“Don’t do that,” hisses Remus, curling fingers into the collar of Sirius’ t-shirt. His eyes are dark, pupils blown, perhaps because the glow from the tea lights is so dim. “Put your tongue away. At least ’til we’ve eaten.”

Sirius glances backward at the basket. “Oh, is there food in there, too?” He wraps fingers around Remus’ wrist, and where the pads of his fingers press into his tendons, he feels it — the skyrocket of Remus’ pulse. _Is he nervous?_ Sirius turns, searches his eyes. _Nothing. Just black._ Distractedly, he asks, “How am I supposed to eat without using my tongue?”

“You know what I mean.” Remus releases him and clambers up onto the bed. “A toast, Sirius. What are we toasting?”

And with Remus weighing down the mattress beside him, half his face and the cut of his cheekbone in the shadow of the canopy, bubbles percolating up in his glass, Sirius sighs so deeply it fogs his own flute.

“Perhaps a toast to Uncle Harvey would be polite,” Sirius murmurs. “And… a toast to you. For being stark raving mad.” His teeth sink into the inside of his lip. Remus’ shoulders rise and fall, slow, with his every breath. “Because no one’s ever fucking done anything like this for me.”

Remus leans over, touches their glasses together again. In a sweet, silent pocket of time, the only sounds between them are the chiming of glass, the broiling of the heater, and Sirius’ heady breath.

“No one else has an Uncle Harvey,” offers Remus quietly. Then he downs half the prosecco in his glass, swallows, sighs, and drains the rest so he can lay the glass on the mattress, roll up his jumper sleeves, and feel inside the basket. “I baked for you,” he informs Sirius.

Sirius snorts sparkling wine up his nose. “Did you?” The question comes after a pause. He thinks Remus is absolutely in the dark about his effect on Sirius, that everything he does and says processes through a different center in his brain, where connections aren’t made at a synaptic speed but slow and hot as the crawl of lava.

Remus throws a packaged Curly the Caterpillar cake onto the mattress.

Sirius has to physically fight laughter, covering his hand with his mouth for a solid five seconds before lowering it and sucking in a desperately-needed stream of air. He follows it with a gulp of prosecco. “This is dinner?”

Remus nods enthusiastically, still rifling through his basket. He pulls out a lighter.

“Did you take it to your friendly neighbourhood Tesco to package it?”

Remus’ mouth cracks in a crooked smile that shows his left canine. “You’re out of questions, by the way.” Then he slams the basket shut and pushes it off the edge of the bed. “I didn’t have a cake plate. I asked, but they only had boxes at Tesco.”

“How kind of them. Y’know, to help with your… your cake-plate-lessness.”

Remus unboxes Curly, then leans into his palm, first tucking one of the joints from the nightstand between his teeth, then setting it aflame. “Say that again.”

Sirius cocks his head to the side. “What, cake-plate-lessness?”

“Again.”

Sirius laughs, flopping onto his side. “Fuck off and get me a fork.”

“Please say it again,” Remus murmurs, now on his stomach so only Curly the Caterpillar lies between them. “You don’t eat cake with a spoon?”

 _“Spoon?”_ Sirius asks in wonder. “Now that’s just bad etiquette. There are _dessert_ _forks_ , Remus —”

“Say it again.” Remus grins through a billow of musty smoke.

Sirius rolls his eyes and drops his cheek to his shoulder. “ _Cake-plate-lessness,_ if it please your highness,” he drawls.

“It please me greatly.” Remus doesn’t offer him the joint and Sirius doesn’t ask for it; he’s content to just look at him. That’s another thing Remus mustn’t know — how Sirius likes to chart the sporadic freckles on his face and neck, observe the way a joint dangles over the swell of his lower lip, count the hairs astray at the thickest parts of his eyebrows. “How much would it upset you if I told you that silverware may have slipped my mind?”

Sirius huffs. “You made me a cake but don’t want me to eat it.” He’s had enough of looking at Remus, he abruptly decides, as he snatches the joint from his mouth. “You evil bastard.”

“On the contrary. Of course I do.” Remus smiles at him complacently, chin rested on crossed arms.

Sirius puffs on the joint as he sits up, muttering, “Think there’s any rusting old silverware in your magic cabinet?” but Remus grabs him by the wrist so he can’t escape.

“There’s none.”

Sirius peers down at him, feeling his cheeks hollow as he takes a deep pull on the joint, breathing in, in, in until his lungs are full. He grins, suddenly, and the smoke must curl from the corners of his mouth like he’d been breathing fire. “Oh, I see. You’re not an evil bastard. Just a dirty one.”

Remus’ answering smile is lazy, and the mattress protests as Remus rolls over onto his back, long fingers fumbling his belt buckle. His jumper rides up, and Sirius laments that they’re always in the semi-dark when they do things, do _this_ , because the skin of Remus’ tummy and the hair curling there make him feel boneless. “Just a horny one,” Remus corrects.

Sirius bites his lip so hard it just might bleed. “Oh?”

“Maybe it’s just that I’ve been thinking about you all week,” murmurs Remus, and Sirius can see that his fingers are antsy. His belt clinks.

Sirius gives Remus the joint so he doesn’t do anything else with his hands — well, hand. Then he drags the boxed cake toward him, looking between the pitifully innocent face of the caterpillar and that of Remus, less innocent, and digs his fingers through the layer of chocolate fondant to scoop up a hefty piece of cake. “Icing inside, too,” he observes, licking some from his finger. “You know, I’d be concerned about bastardising childhood memories, but my mum never bought these, so.” He pops his finger from his mouth noisily. _“I given’t a shit.”_

Remus laughs again, so loud it echoes in the small shop. He’s smoking, free hand innocuous enough on his stomach. “How is it?”

“How’s your baking?”

“Mm.”

Sirius takes an actual bite. It’s vile — too chocolatey, too sugary, but he chokes it down, washes it back with the rest of his prosecco. “It might…” He looks away toward a non-existent horizon. “Might be the best thing I’ve ever tasted.”

“Yeah?”

“Oh, absolutely.”

Remus snickers, holds out his palm to Sirius. “Give me a bite.”

“You want to know how it tastes?”

“That’s the idea.”

“You didn’t taste the batter when you were making it? What kind of baker are you?”

“A _horny_ one, Christ, get over here —”

Sirius tosses the squished hunk of cake back into the box and squirms closer to Remus, who blows a cloud of smoke through the parting of the bed curtains. Sirius frowns down at him, elevated above Remus, bolstered by his elbow. “I wanna taste, too,” he whispers.

Remus’ lidded, glassy eyes scan Sirius’ whole face while he takes the longest puff on a joint known to man, of which Sirius is sure. He counts the seconds but he’s forgotten where he’s at by the time Remus rises to meet him, hooking an elbow around Sirius’ neck as the smoke passes between their mouths, as Sirius inhales greedily, as Remus licks along his lower lip, then inside.

It’s when Sirius goes to straddle Remus and cup his cheek that Remus gasps and drops his head back to the mattress and Sirius sees the error of his calculations. Remus grins sharply despite the chocolate icing smeared across his cheek.

“You’re making a mess, Sirius.”

Sirius arches an eyebrow. He sits against Remus’ hips. “Should I go wash it… off,” he murmurs. Remus is hard against his arse through layers and layers of jeans and there’s only so much composure left in him.

Remus wipes the icing from his own cheek, sucks it quickly from his fingers. “There’s chocolate on your mouth.”

“Shut _up_.”

Remus smiles again, eyes twinkling. “You’re cute.”

Sirius’ neck heats. “Oh, fucking hell.” He stumbles off Remus and the bed. He needs to go for a piss anyway. “Where’s the — the toilet?”

Remus rolls onto his side like the horrible being he is. “Door behind the register. It’s unmarked, but it’s there.”

Sirius weaves through the darkness of the shop, ramming into pieces of antique furniture that will undoubtedly show bruises on his hips and legs come morning. The toilet is small and the fluorescent light is harsh on his eyes, his stranger’s glazed-over eyes that he can’t help but laugh at in the mirror as he washes the sickly cake from his hands. He rubs the chocolate off his face, pisses, washes his hands a second time, and spends the next three minutes clutching the grotty sink, trying to cool his head just to feel a bit more sane but he’s no less _hothothot_ all over come the time he opens his eyes and is re-blinded by the light.

He winds his way back to the corner of the shop, glowing soft through its curtain wall, but when he slips in, the bed is empty.

Sirius lets the curtain fall behind him, stepping warily. “Remus?”

It’s a horrible _bwahhh_ noise or something of the sort that Remus makes when he grabs Sirius from behind, wraps Sirius entirely in his arms and buries his face in Sirius’ neck.

Sirius shouts. Naturally.

“Evil bastard!” he cries out while Remus cackles, smacking every part of him he can reach — the sides of Remus’ arse, for the most part. “I’m never forgiving you,” he adds, trapped in the jail of Remus’ arms.

“No, no, no, no,” murmurs Remus laughingly into his skin, and then he’s palming down Sirius’ chest, over his nipples and under his top and down the vee of his hips and then back up again. “Don’t say that, baby, don’t say that.”

Sirius would complain did it not twist his gut in most pleasant of ways to be called that. Called _baby_. He breathes to steady himself, nudges the side of his head into Remus’ cheek. Mutters, “You’re still hard,” when he presses back into him.

“Said I’d thought about you all week. Did you think I’d stop for five minutes?”

Remus feeds his ego like he doesn’t know how hungry it is. Sirius whispers, “You’re not allowed to think ‘bout me when I’m angry with you.”

Remus gasps out another laugh into his neck, dragging his mouth from collarbone to jawbone. “ _Oh_ , I didn’t know you were _angry_ ,” he murmurs, mocking.

“Then you’re being unobservant.”

“Well, you’re being a bit bratty, aren’t you?”

Sirius is at the weirdest crossroads between amused and astounded. “Remus Lupin!” When Sirius tries to twist in Remus’ arms, Remus lets him. _Suspicious_.

But then he has Sirius by the cheeks and says, right against his mouth, “It’s cute when you get all brave.”

Sirius closes his eyes, tries to feel for purchase on something — Remus’ belt loops, it ends up being. His belt is gone. _Stop calling me_ cute _. Take my clothes off._ _There’s a sodding king bed behind me and I want to use it._

Remus bites him on the lip, opens Sirius’ mouth with his tongue, gathers Sirius’ hair from his face and holds it back, tangled between his fingers. Remus’ fingers are suddenly frantic on Sirius’ fly, ineffective because the two of them are simultaneously stumbling back toward the bed. Sirius scrambles onto the mattress, sits back and lets Remus strip him as he pleases because he’s so bloody eager. Jeans, socks, top, then Remus is standing between Sirius’ legs, palming through his underwear, suckling his nipple, his shoulder.

Sirius is leaking and he hates that when he breathes so fast he does sound like he’s whining, _whimpering_ , but it must drive Remus mad because then he’s getting to his knees before the bed. Fingers circle Sirius’ ankle, lips brush along the inside of his thigh until Remus’ mouth is just barely over the weight of the erection at the front of Sirius’ pants. Then Remus’ fingers walk up his leg, his light touch almost tickling, until he’s massaging them gently into Sirius’ heavy balls, still through the thin fabric of his pants.

Sirius’ head drops back because he can’t quite hold it up anymore. He wants and doesn’t want to look, see Remus’ reaction to the sticky, wet spot at the front of his pants, to Sirius’ stomach rising and falling so, so fast as he breathes.

“Can I suck you?” asks Remus, voice totally level. His agonising fingers toy with the waistband on Sirius’ boxers, and he lowers it enough that when he lets go, it compresses achingly across the head of Sirius’ cock.

Sirius lifts his foggy head around the side, stuttering through an inhale as he nods. “Evil bastard,” he whispers.

Remus smiles up at him. _No idea, you have no fucking idea…_ And with one hand, he works Sirius’ pants down, ineffectually, mostly, because Sirius is jelly-legged and can’t lift his hips and Remus is half-focused on grabbing Sirius’ hand, holding it reverently in his own, sucking and biting and kissing each knuckle one by one.

Then Remus climbs onto the bed, pushing on the center of Sirius’ chest and muttering, “Move.”

Sirius squirms backward to make room — the caterpillar cake is gone, but there’s a few crumbs left behind by Sirius himself — and he’s up against the pillows as Remus, a mere silhouette in the shadow of the canopy, tugs his ugly jumper over his head.

Sirius doesn’t touch himself, only because he apparently likes the ache as much as Remus likes to watch him ache, remembers how Remus had warned him against it in the car by the lido. And possibly because watching Remus undress himself with such fervent quickness numbs his limbs into submission. Remus leaves his pants on, leaving Sirius with just a glimpse of the jut of his cock in his boxers before he lowers himself onto the mattress between Sirius’ legs, divests him of his boxers, and takes his cock in his mouth. 

_“Oh,”_ Sirius groans. He could count on one hand — _on two fingers_ — how many times he’s been blown. He’d come. Eventually. But Remus — _Remus_ has only just put his lips around him and already Sirius’ skin is sticky with sweat. Sirius’ nails are too blunt to catch on skin when he tries to squeeze Remus’ shoulder or the back of his neck, but there’s so much tension building, coiling at every joint in his body, fingers clenching, because Remus is dragging his hot tongue over Sirius’ cock and yet he’s so gentle where his fingertips stroke dryly between Sirius’ cheeks, where his palm brushes his balls again, only now bare, skin on skin.

Sirius brushes away the tufts of hair dropping into Remus’ eyes. It only earns him a look from Remus, beneath his eyelashes, that flashes with a heart-and gut-wrenching mischief that has Sirius’ thighs trembling around him.

A hoarse _Remus_ is the only warning Sirius gives, which is why when he releases, arching from the bed, it’s onto Remus’ tongue. And Remus’ chin. This Sirius only comprehends once he’s forced open his eyes and is catching his breath and Remus is there, crawling up over him, smirking down at him in a way that makes Sirius’ face burn.

“Oh, fuck,” whispers Sirius.

Remus bats his eyes.

“Fuck, fuck, I’m sorry.” He gets onto his elbows, reaches up to him but hesitates because _that’s my spunk on Remus’ face, god, you fucking idiot_ , and then Remus licks his lips and Sirius’ arms start to wobble underneath him.

“Instead of apologising,” Remus murmurs, kissing Sirius’ cheek, wet and messy for a number of reasons, “you could turn over.”

Sirius hums absently to acknowledge that. Now Remus has tasted him, _really_ tasted him, which starts a forest fire in the pit of Sirius’ stomach. Before he rolls onto his stomach, he touches a light kiss to Remus’ lips, enough to smear come on his chin that he doesn’t wipe away. Under his skin he’s still prickling with heat all over as he lays his forehead to the backs of his wrists.

Sirius feels Remus get off the bed and back on. Then warm hands rub over his arse. “Do you mind if I,” Remus mutters and never quite finishes, and Sirius gets on his elbows again, peering over his shoulder. Remus has his head cocked sweetly, his thumbs sinking into the dimple at the bottom of Sirius’ spine. “I won’t fuck you, but, can I just…” Remus starts to push his own pants down. He’s so hung that Sirius makes a small, inevitable noise when he sees.

Laying like this, on his front, unable to see what Remus sees, glancing backward to see the curves of his own bare arse… It feels foreign. Foreign that he should feel comfortable with anyone seeing him this way in the first place. Sirius lays his head down again. Remus does more than see him like this, though — he looms over Sirius now, breaths audible, and presses against the cleft of Sirius’ arse. “Can I,” he whispers, bucking gently. “Please, Sirius.”

Sirius thinks he has an erection again. “Yeah,” he tells Remus brokenly, because he’s lost his voice now, too, it seems.

Remus spreads lube over Sirius’ crack, over himself. And then he pins Sirius to the mattress by his shoulders as he fucks against him, almost feral in his fervor. Sirius can barely breathe under the pressure and he likes it, likes to hear the changes in Remus’ breathing when he squeezes his muscles around him.

When Remus climaxes, he groans gruff and strained and collapses over Sirius’ back onto the mess he’s made. For a pause, they both just breathe, skin on skin from head to toe.

Then Remus comes alive to attack Sirius’ neck with love bites, fingers pinching at sensitive spots at Sirius’ waist and stomach and under his arms as if there’s a need to commemorate their fuck with needless laughter.

**FRIDAY 21:45**

Sirius is tangled in the sheets. Remus sits atop them, nibbling at a bit of fondant off Curly’s back. 

“Someday I’ll direct a film with you as the star,” Remus says. He’s attentively picking the sweets off the cake now, forming a collection in the palm of his hand. “My _muse_.”

Sirius, sleepy, smiles and mumbles, “Yeah?”

Remus nods swiftly. “Oh, yeah. And you just have one of those names, y’know? Wouldn’t even want to change your name for the script. S’a name like… like James Bond. Donnie Darko. I could call the film _Sirius Black_ but I’ve been thinking and a play on just _Black_ could be interesting. Like, like… the _blank_ of Black. I haven’t got plot ideas for shit, but, just, _The Inevitability of Black?_ Or… or _Black’s Affliction?_ Those sound like film’s I’d want to watch.”

Sirius snorts. “How ‘bout _Black’s Biology?_ Like _Grey’s Anatomy?”_

Remus laughs, then dumps his handful of sweets in his mouth. “I think I’d want less boning in my film than on a hospital programme. Seattle, though, Seattle is a… It’s a place with atmosphere. I like rain, rainy scenes. Could be… _Oh_ , one thing Shonda Rhimes does do quite well? Kill off characters.” He glances Sirius’ way, eyes intense, pointing his forefinger so it nearly brushes Sirius’ nose. “She can make you fall in love with a character only to kill them off real quick, right out from under your nose. And when you love a character like that, Sirius, that’s what makes it so impactful. Like, alright, there’s the watery — _literally_ —” Remus laughs again, more of a bark this time — “death of Jack in _Titanic_ , but, like, _I_ don’t bloody care, I don’t care Jack’s dying ‘cos I’m too distracted by the fact that he could’ve absolutely fit on the fucking door, _Rose_.”

Remus scoots closer so they’re hip-to-hip. Sirius has to sit up straight, hugging his pillow to his chest, so they’ll be eye-to-eye, too. Remus continues, “When you kill a character, you want to make it like — like Bambi’s mum. Nobody sees that coming, and yet when it comes, it’s all you see or hear or feel for the next few minutes.” Remus tips his head back against the headboard, carved with floral curlicues.

Sirius’ smile has faded. Remus’ eyes are steady — they don’t leave him once — but his words only seem to come faster.

“In my film,” says Remus, “in _Black’s Affliction_ , or whatnot, I’ll make the audience fall in love.” Remus touches his fingertips to Sirius’ palm. “They’ll love you so much, Sirius.” Their fingers are laced together. Remus holds Sirius’ hand sandwiched between his own. “And do you know where I’ll premiere my film, baby?”

Sirius lifts his brows. He can tell that Remus is waiting for him to ask, won’t just give away the answer. “Where?”

“At our wedding,” Remus whispers conspiratorially. Then he bites his lips, hard, so hard Sirius sees the clenched, white pressure of them against the pink skin as Remus smiles.

Sirius’ chuckle is like an exhale. “We’re getting married?”

“You don’t want to be married?” Remus traces his fingers down the tendons in the back of Sirius’ hand. “Of course we’ll be married. Half our reception — half of it will be spent in a theatre. Or then we’ll have a big screen out in the garden. Garden weddings are nice. Of course, it’ll have to be a big enough garden to fit all the guests we’ll invite.”

Sirius looks at their clasped hands. “I don’t know _who_ you’re planning on inviting, but I think I’ll need four invites, max. If my brother even decides to come, that is. And maybe a courtesy invite for my uncle’s widower.”

Remus rolls his eyes, shakes his head wildly. “The whole cast and crew will be there, Sirius.” He grins. “ _Keanu Reeves_ will be there.”

_“Keanu?”_

“He’ll play your father in my film, of course.” Remus twists fingers into the ends of Sirius’ hair. “Then again — have you seen _Dracula?_ As brilliant as he is, Keanu’s British English is abysmal… So we’ll film it in the States! Set it in the States! In a not-so-humble upper middle class suburb of… _Chicago_. Not LA or New York. It’s too overdone.” Remus is looking past the bed now, into the darkness of the room beyond. “If we’re in America, then — oh, oh, then we’ll have the kid from _Stranger Things_ play your younger brother.”

Sirius, entertained by the thought of anyone but Regulus as his brother, smiles faintly. “Mike?”

“Yes!” Remus laughs, butting his forehead into Sirius’ shoulder. “Mike from _Stranger Things_. Mike, Mike, Mike. With the hair, yes.” He nuzzles into Sirius’ neck. “Highest grossing films, here we come.”

Sirius cards his fingers through the back of Remus’ hair. “Right.”

**FRIDAY 22:19**

Sirius has been drifting in and out of sleep for twenty minutes. It’s Remus’ thumb, stroking ceaselessly up and down his cheekbone and over the arch of his eyebrow, that’s keeping him awake. It’s not that he hasn’t the heart to tell him to stop. He just doesn’t want to.

He cracks his eyes open as he feels Remus’ leg shift between his ankles.

Remus affords him with a small smile. “Do you think we split up after _Love Island?”_

Sirius blinks heavily. “What?”

“In the _Love Island_ universe, did we split up after we won?”

Sirius chuckles, snaking his arm around Remus’ waist. “Nah.”

Remus smiles in response. Then he slips from beneath Sirius’ arm. “Put on your shoes.”

Sirius rubs slumber from his eyes. Remus is stark naked and slipping into his boots. “Only shoes?”

“We only need shoes.” He proceeds to gather the comforter from the bed into his arms, leaving Sirius vulnerable to the air. Then Remus disappears behind the curtain, returning momentarily with several blankets more in his collection. “Shoes on!” he nags, seeing Sirius still sleep-muddled and confused on the bed.

Sirius does as he’s told. Remus wraps him in one of the smaller blankets, one that smells like the cellar of Sirius’ old family home. Bundling the others under one arm, he takes Sirius’ hand and guides him into the back of the shop.

Through a door, there’s a staircase. They climb five storeys, passing numbered doors of residences, without stopping to take a rest though Sirius would’ve and should’ve. It takes Remus several, aggressive rams of his shoulder into a metal door on the topmost floor to wrest it open. Sirius clutches his blanket tighter around him, stepping out.

They’re on the roof. The wind whips through Sirius’ hair and blows it into his eyes. London twinkles all around with street lamps and the yellow and blue glows of lit windows. There’s an old outdoor swing, the rickety kind with its own canopy and cushions, that Remus tosses all but one of the blankets onto. The last he holds loosely around himself, almost like a toga, doing nothing to keep the wind out.

Sirius takes a step toward him. “What are we doing up here?”

Remus whirls around, facing Sirius. His hand finds its favorite spot on Sirius’ jaw as he plants a kiss to the middle of his forehead. “If we’re together in all the parallel universes, Sirius,” he murmurs, crowding into Sirius’ space, “then we’ve reached perfect harmony. In space and time and all that exists. And… _I_ want it to stay like that forever.” He drags his fingers down Sirius’ arm, touch faint through the feathery down layer. “And what’s the only way to immortalise something? To make it the very same forever?” He’s backpedaling closer to the roof’s edge. “It’s to kill it at its peak,” says Remus, louder over the rush of the wind, closing his fingers into a fist around the air. “There’s no memories beyond that. It’ll be the same forever.”

Sirius, feeling leaden but hollow, heart echoing in a vast, empty space inside his chest, gets to Remus’ side though he doesn’t remember walking. “Remus,” he says, taking his hand. His voice breaks. His eyes flit over the edge of the roof. He doesn’t want to think about the drop now, not even in a comical sense.

Remus’ face is blank. Then he doubles over in laughter, squatting to the pebbled concrete of the roof. “Oh, your _face_.” He’s up again, breathing harsh and shrill and giggly, hands closing over Sirius’ shoulders. The corners of his eyes and the bridge of his nose crinkle with mirth. “Oh, baby, your face. _Joke_ , it was a joke.”

Sirius is embarrassed. He’s embarrassed to be on a cold roof, shielded from the elements only by a thin, billowing layer of cloth, with Remus laughing at him. More than that, though, he’s furious. “Jokes like that aren’t fucking funny.” His eyes flash over Remus, veins coursing with a caustic hot-cold sensation. And the fact that Remus is still, _still_ smiling pushes him over the edge. _Not the roof’s edge, but — Christ._

Sirius is nearly at the door when Remus steps in front of him. Sirius can’t look him in the eye. When Remus mumbles, “Sirius,” he sinks into Remus, forehead to his shoulder. Remus holds him. Whispers his apology, excusing his bad humour. Sirius doesn’t excuse it himself, but he does mutter “Evil bastard,” once or twice, lets Remus lead him to what he says is _“the real reason for coming up here.”_

They cocoon themselves in blankets on the swing. Sirius’ head is in Remus’ lap. Remus makes sure that Sirius’ toes, curling pink against the cold, are under the cover of their cocoon. Remus’ waffling on about the view is lost to the wind, and Sirius hums along until he can’t anymore, falling to sleep with Remus’ fingers in his hair.

**FRIDAY 23:39**

_We’re outside_ , Sirius remembers when his eyes half-open. He doesn’t know how long he’s been asleep, but the night is as black as it was when he’d passed out. Remus’ fingers still sift through his hair. He’s warm, even his toes.

“Are you nocturnal?” whispers Sirius. He noses against Remus’ thigh. His eyes sag shut.

Remus laughs softly up above. It makes him warmer.

**SATURDAY 01:00**

“I think it’s illegal to swim in the Thames,” says Remus.

Sirius’ reply is a longwinded groan. He draws his knees close to his chest.

“Which is odd, considering it’s cleaner now than it’s been in over a hundred years.” Remus twists a lock of Sirius’ hair around his finger. “Do you remember when David Walliams swam down the Thames?”

“What?” Sirius whispers. He rubs the flat of his hand over his nose.

“It was seven years ago, I think. Or eight?”

Sirius pulls the blanket up to his chin.

**SATURDAY 01:31**

Remus is shifting out from beneath him. Sirius rolls onto his back in the empty space left on the swing, swaddled by blankets. “Don’t go anywhere,” whispers Remus as he kneels beside the swing, touching Sirius’ cheek.

Sirius opens one eye. “What’re you doing?” He yawns, turning his face into the cushion.

Remus smiles at him. “Going for a swim.”

The wind paints Sirius’ hair across his forehead. “A swim,” he echoes in a daze.

“Or I might fly instead.”

Sirius huffs a quiet chuckle. “Okay.”

“Don’t go anywhere,” Remus murmurs again. He detangles himself from his blanket and lays it over Sirius.

**SATURDAY 01:38**

Sirius sits bolt upright on the swing. He has to swat at the blankets feverishly to extricate himself from the cocoon. Remus’ shoes are gone. “Remus?” He wraps himself in the thinnest blanket as he scans the roof, stumbling into his strewn boots.

Empty.

“Remus?”

Sirius sucks in a harsh breath that chills his lungs and pads to the roof’s edge. But there’s nothing on the street. No one. A streetlamp flickers dubiously.

“Shit,” he breathes weakly.

Sirius’ boots clang down flights and flights of metal stairs. He goes flying around the banister at each landing, one hand sliding along the railing, the other clamping the blanket shut across his middle. “Remus?” he calls the moment he steps back inside Harvey’s, but there’s no one in sight, nothing but the rumpled bed they’d tumbled in hours earlier and the remnants of the caterpillar cake and the jarred electric tea lights, one knocked onto the floor. _Harvey’s_ is too densely-packed for his voice to echo, but the dusty silence that follows tells him there’s no one there.

He peeks around the curtain. The roller shutters are thrown up toward the ceiling. Remus’ clothes are by Sirius’ feet.

Sirius dresses in a hurry. He’s just barely buttoning his jeans as he stumbles out the door and into the street, the dark-blue void of the street. He hears a car roll by on an adjacent street. Nothing else.

“Remus?!” he shouts again, nearly cries this time, but only his own echoes call back to him. His mother would laugh at the octave of his voice, point at his crumpled face and tear-stained cheeks. “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he seethes, grappling for a hold on his hair, spinning like Remus might appear from any of the three-hundred sixty degrees around him.

Sirius stumbles dizzily to lean against the wall of _Harvey’s_ , forehead pressed painfully to the dirty, hard brick as the white light of his phone refracts in the wetness pooling in his eyes. He kicks at the wall and his toe throbs and he sinks down the wall and holds the phone to his ear with the reticence of a blood-stained white flag of surrender.

He hears Ros long before he sees her. He’d also phoned Remus four times until he’d realised the buzzing was coming from Remus’ phone inside the shop and wasn’t just a tinny noise playing in his rattled ears.

Sirius scrambles to his feet. Ros walks briskly, blonde curls bouncing around her ears. She doesn’t look alarmed at all; in fact, she looks right through Sirius at the sign of _Harvey’s_ , at the ajar door. On the phone, he’d blubbered _it’s this furniture shop, Harvey’s something, I forget_ , and she’d said _yeah, I know it_ before Sirius could even stumble into the street and get a look at the sign himself.

“He,” starts Sirius, and he’s startled when it sounds nothing like himself, wheezing and desperate and slurring. “He was — we were asleep and then he was just _gone_ , and I’ve looked everywhere and he must’ve gone out somewhere but he’s not fucking wearing any _clothes_ and — and I thought, I thought maybe he’d _jumped_ , because he’d said something about it earlier…” Sirius glances toward the building, five storeys up where they’d laid in peace for hours.

Ros’ eyes rove the street the same Sirius’ had. “We’d know it if he’d jumped,” she mutters lowly, arms folded over her chest. “You said he’s naked?” Her hand rubs across her eyes; she’s not wearing any makeup to smudge. “Fuck.”

“Said something about swimming,” says Sirius, palm rubbing the back of his neck raw. Ros’ presence was meant to be reassuring but it’s doing nothing for the plummeting feeling in his stomach, like he’s dangling at the top of a rollercoaster that’ll never come down. “In the Thames.”

Ros shakes her head. “He could be anywhere by now. At the Thames, even. We just have to wait for the police to find him.”

Sirius’ hand slips from his neck. “Police?”

Ros doesn’t flinch.

Sirius starts to shake his head. “I don’t… I _don’t_ think we should get the cops involved.”

Ros laughs. It’s a sharp chord that pains his ears. “What’s your brilliant idea, then, Sirius? Scour the entire city before morning? _Before_ someone phones the cops about the naked, manic man in the streets?”

Sirius scratches at the lump in his throat but it’s unreachable. He’s not so sure he’s even listening to Ros. His vision’s all black but for the blonde dot at the very corner of his periphery, blurring together into a bubbling, sickening tar, fumes getting to his head. “But he was,” he says, hysterical and choked-up even to his own ears, pointing in an aimless direction up the road, wracking his brain for threads of reason, “he told me to _stay_ , and, and I don’t even know what’s happening —”

Ros shoves at his shoulder, and suddenly he sees her again. “He’s bipolar, Sirius,” she hisses. “Remus is bipolar. He’s having a manic episode.”

Sirius blinks at her. The blink squeezes tears from his eyes. _Bipolar. Bipolar…_ “What?”

She’s now tenser than before, brows pinched, looking him over in rapid flicks of her eyes. “Did you smoke?”

Sirius pinches at the lump in his throat.

“Did you _smoke_ , Sirius?!” she screams this time.

Sirius steps backward, thinking of the joints behind Remus’ ears. Of Remus licking through smoke into his mouth. He nods, scarcely more than a tremble.

Ros shakes her head. Curls tumble into her face. “He can’t. He shouldn’t. It’s bad for him, Sirius, it makes it worse.” Ros’ accusing glare burns him wherever it touches. She turns her back to him when her phone rings. “Yes, this is she. Yes. Yes, thank you. No, I can reach his parents. Yes, I’ll be there soon. Thank you.” The moment her phone is pocketed, Ros heads in the direction she’d come from.

Sirius jogs after her. “Was it the cops?”

She says nothing, booted heels clicking.

 _“Ros,”_ Sirius pleads, and he barely touches her before she turns on him.

“Stop following me. Stop following me and go home, Sirius. Take your shit out of Harvey’s and go.”

Sirius’ mouth is dry. “I want to see him.”

“Chances are, he doesn’t want to see you,” Ros says icily. “If not now, then it’ll be soon enough. Do you know what you are, Sirius?” She pauses for a beat, like he might try to answer. “You’re an obsession. You’re a fucking obsession, and it’s best you forget about him before he forgets about you first.”

Sirius stares at her through watery eyes, lips parting audibly to gasp for breath. “I’m _not_ —”

“But you are!” Ros laughs. To Sirius it sounds menacing. “He doesn’t care about you. Everything Remus does is on a whim. You. Stealing the key to my uncle’s shop. Deciding to miss his A-levels.”

“Your uncle,” mumbles Sirius, deflating.

“Everything.” Ros’ eyes are stone-hard. She takes another breath and tells him, “Leave him alone. You barely know him. It shouldn’t be too hard.”

Ros shakes her head as she turns away. It’s so parental that Sirius wants to hurl something at her, or perhaps that’s because she’s just shredded his perverted, little illusion right before his eyes.

Ros rounds the street corner. Sirius staggers to the kerb, waits with his face in his hands for the ground to fall out from underneath him.

It doesn’t, so he goes home.


	9. One plus one equals three

**MONDAY 16:15**

Sirius ungraciously dumps his bag next to the computer. He considers powering it on, then lays his forearms to his bag, clasping at opposite elbows with his hands, slumping slowly, slowly down until his face is pressed to the rough fabric of his rucksack and his eyelids are so compressed all he can see is blackness and dull sparks. _It’s just you and me, ISAC,_ he thinks, but the robot is off and anyhow, it’s just an arm, won’t parrot back _good evening, Daddy_ the way James commanded Siri to on Sirius’ phone.

His legs just barely hold him up. In fact, they almost fail him when there’s a sudden, hollow _clankclankclank_ from behind.

Lily, _Lily Evans_ , stands on the other side of the glass separating ISAC from the rest of the lab. He doesn’t think he’s ever seen her set foot in here, in his domain, and he feels his hackles rising. Lily raps her knuckles to the glass again, smiling warily now. Her stockings are thick and magenta and clash pleasantly with her bright hair and eyes and turquoise dress, her whole being a splash of color in the gray computer lab.

“Go away, I’m working,” Sirius calls, setting his hand decisively on the mouse and nodding at the computer.

Lily drops her arm to her side, stares at him, squinting so he can’t see the green. “The computer’s off,” she shouts back, and it reverberates against the glass walls.

Sirius bites the tip of his tongue, eyes flitting over his immediate surroundings. It’s no use making excuses to Lily now, and still he prattles off, “I’m _going_ to be working, very, _very_ soon, so it’d be in your best interest to —”

“Hi,” Lily says, using her indoor-voice and pushing open the door.

Sirius laments not locking it behind himself, but what would that make him? Eighteen and locking himself alone into rooms? _It’s the only private room I have,_ Sirius thinks with no real bite as he watches Lily wander toward ISAC curiously.

“Be careful,” he mutters, shoving the mouse away and resuming his slouch against the worktop.

“Oh, I was planning on pouring water all over it, is that okay?”

It doesn’t make Sirius laugh. He drops his face to his arms. “Lily, why…”

“Because you spent the entire weekend alone under your blanket.”

“Technically speaking, the sofa is my _bedroom_ , so —”

“Look, Sirius.” Lily turns toward him — he can’t see it, but her volume rises. “You don’t have to tell me what’s going on. I just wanted you to know it’ll pass.”

He peers at her from behind his arm. His vision takes a moment to adjust to the light. _“It’ll pass,”_ he echoes blankly. “Good to know. See, I had this lentil curry the other day, and I’ve been positively despondent that it’ll _never_ pass, but I think you’ve renewed my hope.” He smiles dryly. “Ta everso.”

Lily doesn’t even crack a smile. She blinks quickly, several times in succession. Sirius gets the message. The message is _dumbass_. “Heartbreak,” Lily says then, and a little too loudly. She clears her throat. “Heartbreak. It’ll pass. It may not feel like it now, it may not feel like it’ll _ever_ go away, but it will.”

Sirius smiles and it pains him to do so, which is probably why it feels more like a grimace and Lily appears unsettled. “I’m not,” states Sirius, “ _heartbroken_.”

“Remus is the first boy you’ve been with. There will be others! Plenty others! You’re so young, Sirius.” He enjoys the way she’s talking down to him like she’s his senior when he knows for a fact he’s got two months on her. “I know you can’t just _turn off_ being upset about him, but it’ll blow over. It will.”

Sirius lays his head on his bag again. “What do you know about heartbreak, Evans?”

“My heartbreak is the reason the sofa’s your bedroom, Sirius.” Lily’s close by, then, laying a hand against his arm, shaking him gently. Admittedly… _comfortingly_. 

When Sirius sighs into his arms, his own breath warms his face.

“It’s tough. And it hurts, and you try to blame everyone you can, including yourself. But it passes.”

Sirius snorts and lifts his head, feeling like an ostrich. “Yeah, I get it, it’ll pass,” he mutters, looking not at Lily’s eyes but at the weird necklace around her neck. A geometric fox, he thinks. _Bloody hell_. “How’d you even find me?” He shifts to lean up against his side so his ribs dig into the table. Jabs the power button on the computer. “You’re not… you don’t take any techs.”

Lily folds her arms over her chest, peering out the windows. “I asked Potter.”

Sirius is typing in his password — an excruciatingly long but secure string of random character sequences separated by hyphens — and loses track after _x3MTLw. “What?”_

“Potter told me.”

Sirius tongues the inside of his cheek. “You talked to _James_.”

Lily frowns at him so the white skin between her eyebrows creases twice. “Yes. Why is that breaking news to you?”

Sirius chuckles, counts the number of dots in the password entry box, and continues typing. “Damn. Well, one: I’m sorry for his mum, ‘cos she still does his laundry and he’s probably soiled his khakis by now. And two…” His eyes flicker from their corners to Lily again. “You really weren’t lying about heartbreak _passing_ , yeah?”

It’s working to distract her, Sirius thinks. She tips her head toward him. “I did it out of concern for _you_.” Then she looks him over. “It meant nothing.”

Sirius snorts delightedly. “To you.” The computer chimes brightly, as if awakening from a pleasant, digital sleep. “Right… _working_.”

Lily smacks and, in turn, squeezes his shoulder. Then she leaves.

**TUESDAY 12:31**

Sirius has gone three days without opening his Messenger app. Three days he’s had his phone on _Do Not Disturb_ , watching idly as the number inside the little red badge goes up and up and he ignores them all. The first four had been from Remus, which he’d dutifully ignored without reading their contents. But for all he knows, Barack Obama has found him on Facebook and took the liberty of personally reaching out to him. He won’t risk checking, not if it means Remus will see he’s _been online_ or some shit like that.

And yet, on his way home post-lab-time the evening prior, after someone passed him on the crosswalk and the wind had blown their weed-thick scent his way, Sirius spent the hours until he fell asleep thinking only of Remus. Then he’d awoken, rolled himself a joint, thrown open the living room windows, and smoked it in one go.

That morning before class, he’d run into James, who’d given him one sniff and laughed his way down the corridor once he’d dropped Sirius off at the door to the Maths classroom. And it’s safe to say Sirius didn’t absorb much in Maths.

He’s in the Canteen, unloading onto the table whatever he’d tossed in his rucksack in his stupor. He’s frowning at a tupperware crammed full of roasted broccoli ( _not_ what he’d thought it was in the morning) when, from the corner of his eye — _yes, he has his phone unlocked, as if he’s just asking for it_ — he sees the number in the badge on Messenger jump. One, twice, thrice. He picks up his phone, staring intently at the screen, clutching the gadget so hard he’s nearly worried it’ll crumple like tin foil in his grip, when James sits down across from him.

“You still stoned, Mr. Wake-and-Bake?” James smirks, blindly forking peas. They all fall off before he can get the fork to his mouth.

 _“No,”_ mutters Sirius, locking his phone. “Just tired.” He pops the lid on the tupperware, grimaces at the broccoli. He can’t remember why he’d thought anything boxed and green could be appetising.

James hums suggestively, now going for beans instead. He does this odd dance with his shoulders, wiggling to and fro, with his head unmoving. It’s a bit disturbing. “Remus been keeping you up?”

Sirius says nothing, watches a pea roll across the table. Then, “No. I haven’t seen him since Friday night.”

James freezes. “ _What?_ You were free all this weekend? I spent six hours at a bloody sculpture garden with my mother because _I_ thought you and Remus would be shagging up a storm and thereby, when I slipped and told mum I didn’t have any plans ‘cos _nah, Sirius’ll be with his boyfriend all weekend_ , she had me deliver on my good-son-obligations.”

Sirius lays his forehead to his hand. “You could always just be a bad son.” His lips tug slightly.

James snorts, then greedily scoops at his beans. “Not a chance. I want the Switch for my birthday.”

Sirius rubs his hands over his face, grunts something along the lines of _bloody toff._

James adjusts his glasses, smiling lopsidedly at Sirius as he jeers, “What? You two split up already?”

Sirius laces his fingers on the table. His eyes are fixed somewhere through the window, where the trees are barren and don’t even seem to sway in the wind. “I don’t know.”

James coughs. “ _What?_ That was a — I meant it as a joke. You’ve not actually split up, have you? What do you mean you _don’t know?”_

Stark silhouettes of trees blur into the background of the clouded-over sky as Sirius’ eyes go out of focus. “For one, I _didn’t know_ until Friday that Remus is bipolar.”

“Who’s bipolar?” Benjy makes a show of dropping his tray to the table beside James, and the force causes a projectile _splat_ of beans across the hem of his shirt. “Oh, tits,” he mutters.

Peter sits beside Sirius, eyeing the untouched broccoli as he pulls out a sandwich his mother made him. “Want half?”

Sirius shakes his head.

“Think I might have that yogurt —” Peter’s saying, just as Benjy decides he’s wiped enough bean residue off his clothes and repeats, “What’re we talking about? Who’s bipolar?”

Sirius rubs a hand over his chin, locks eyes with James, who merely shrugs. So he says, “Remus.”

“Huh.” Benjy tears his bread roll in half and shoves a chunk in his mouth. “My sister’s bipolar, too.”

“The one at uni?” asks James absently, and Benjy nods.

Sirius’ mouth thins into a line. “Sorry, mate.”

Benjy looks his way, a hair’s breadth from letting the sodden glob of bread drop right out of his open mouth. “What for?”

Sirius blinks slowly. “I just. I bet it’s rough.”

Benjy just stares at him a moment, so unreadable that Sirius checks over his shoulder to see if it is _him_ that Benjy’s watching. There’s no one there. Benjy’s nose wrinkles thoughtfully. “I mean, I guess. Funny, more often that not.” He dips his napkin in his cup of water, supposedly to keep wiping at his bean stain.

“Funny?” echoes Sirius, though Benjy follows quickly with, “How’d you find out about Remus? He tell you, ‘r summat?”

Sirius scrapes his teeth over his lower lip. The tabletop is a horrid, speckled pattern he’d never noticed in all his years at school, and yet, now he can’t seem to look away from it. “He… left while I was asleep. Naked. To go swim in the Thames.”

Benjy’s eyes bulge. “He left the house _naked?”_

 _House… or Harvey’s Furniture Village_. Sirius nods.

Benjy bursts into laughter. He claps James loudly on the shoulder, which, like contagion, has James brimming with laughter, too, though likely of bewilderment in part. “Did he, then? Did he make it to the Thames?” asks Benjy, wheezing and wiping at wetness pooling in his eyes.

When Sirius glances at Peter, it’s evident he’s trying his hardest not to smile. “No, the cops found him first — _why_ are you laughing? It isn’t funny.”

Benjy’s hand slips from James’ shoulder to smack against the table. “But it is, Sirius. You’re telling me you don’t find the thought of your boyfriend running arse-fucking-naked ‘round London funny?”

Sirius only stares, his brow pinched.

“Hey, okay, just — listen to me. My sister’s been seeing this bloke since, like, year ten, right? And a couple years back she found out he’d been accepted to, like, some political science school in Paris before _he_ even knew, and she was manic and so fucking _excited_ that she straight-up _Eurostar_ ed down to Paris one weekend, toured a few flats and signed a lease on one in _le_ bloody _sixième arrondissement_ , and came back with this massive fucking macaron cake.” Benjy looks thoughtfully past Sirius’ shoulder. “It was _damn_ good. But, yeah. Turned out her boyfriend didn’t even want to study politics.” He grins. “And we had a very feisty Parisian landlady on our hands.”

“No shit,” murmurs James, brows raised in disbelief.

Benjy nods, tenting his fingers. Then he sits up straighter. “Oh! You remember last year when for like, a week, I came to school wearing my dad’s massive clothes?”

“I just thought you were going through a phase,” murmurs Peter.

“Nah. S’just that Jessie got overzealously philanthropic and decided to donate _all_ my clothes to Oxfam. And they don’t do take-backs.”

James sighs wistfully. “I bet that right now, somewhere out there, your six collectible _Rick and Morty_ tops are on the backs of six lucky, lucky people.”

Benjy chuckles. “I hope they’re enjoying them. They all had pit stains.”

“Gross.”

Benjy shrugs, chewing on his bread as he turns on Sirius again. “Where’s Remus at now, then?”

Sirius nibbles on his lip, shrugs his shoulders. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen him here. Probably at home.”

Benjy smiles faintly. “Not — not literally _where_ , I mean, like — is he still manic? It’s different for everyone, but my sister’s depressive episodes tend to last a couple weeks after she comes down from the mania.”

Sirius doesn’t quite look Benjy in the eyes. “I don’t know. Haven’t spoken to him since he went off on Friday.”

Benjy hums around a mouthful. “He been ignoring you?”

Sirius shifts. “No.”

Benjy stops chewing. “He reach out to you?”

Sirius scratches the back of his neck.

Benjy looks at James, Peter, and finally Sirius again. “You’ve been ignoring him? _Mate_ — why? Just because —”

“I can’t!” hisses Sirius, slamming his hands against the table. “Not when he’s _like this_ —”

“Well, no, mania isn’t the _best_ time to try and get through to him, but, Sirius, he’s been _like this_ the whole time you’ve known him! You just didn’t know about it! And you liked him well enough before, didn’t you? Christ, you were practically drooling all over us outside when we met him. He’s the same, you just… now you know he has ups and downs sometimes.”

Sirius’ fingers curl into a fist. At his side, Peter has a mouthful of sandwich, and across the table, James has his eyes trained on Sirius. “But,” Sirius mumbles, smushing his nose against his fist. “But I can’t just.” He sighs. “When Remus ran off, I panicked and called Ros ‘cos I figured she’d know what to do, but then she told me to stay away from him, that he wouldn’t even want to see me anymore, and…” He sounds pathetic. He _feels_ pathetic as his eyes bore into the pattern on the table.

Hesitantly, James raises a hand, as if they’re in class. “Who’s Ros?”

Benjy nods quickly, like he has the same question.

“Remus’ ex-girlfriend. Or — I don’t know, maybe they’re together again, who fucking knows.”

James and Benjy lock eyes, then look at Sirius like he’s just discovered his hands at the ripe age of eighteen. “His _ex_ told you to fuck off and you’re listening to her?” says Benjy.

James holds up a finger on each hand. “One plus one equals three.”

“Sirius, mate, sometimes you’re the smartest person I know. Other times… like a sodding sack of potatoes.”

James frowns thoughtfully. “Was gonna say _takes a sack to know a sack_ , but… you’ve been shockingly illuminating this lunch hour, Benjamin.”

“What’s the next intelligent root vegetable up from potato?” asks Peter.

James mulls this over. “Beet, maybe?”

“Congratulations, Ben, you’ve graduated to _sack of beets_ ,” Peter proclaims.

“Shut up,” says Benjy, eyes still on Sirius. “But, really, Sirius, just ‘cos Remus has been manic doesn’t mean everything he’s said or done’s suddenly a lie.” He pops the lid on his fruit pot, digging between melon chunks to get to the grapes at the bottom. “I mean… it wasn’t just you drooling, honestly. Lads and I were, like, crossing the fucking Nile River of drool when you were together. And sure, it’ll be rough, ‘specially when he’s down and you feel like there’s nothing you can do to help, but there is. You can be there after, when he’s willing to let you in.” Benjy’s eyes flicker to Sirius’ phone. “And something tells me he is.” He reaches the grape finally, forks it into his mouth. “If we’re done here, can we discuss why tasteless melons should be eradicated from the planet?”

**FRIDAY 18:55**

Sirius is on the march between the Tube stop and Regulus’ school when the chime of a text message interrupts the music blaring through his headphones. He’s close enough to the school that he’ll make it in time, so he stops in place, leans up against the chain link fence — still creepy — and unlocks his phone.

**_Regulus: Saw this last week but I forgot to answer til now_ **

**_Regulus: Because_ **

**_Regulus: Were you kidding about the boyfriend?_ **

**_Regulus: Just saw that Mum and Dad are in the audience_ **

Sirius looks past the bright light of the screen and into the street, letting his phone blur into a smudge of white in the corner of his vision. Then he types back:

**_Sirius: just a joke don’t worry_ **

**_Sirius: almost there though. Break a leg_ **

**_Sirius: i mean your fingers_ **

He trudges onward, follows a group of smartly-dressed couples through the open gates into the schoolyard.

 _No. No boyfriend_. He hasn’t replied to Remus’ texts, mostly because they’d stopped coming the evening after Benjy’s talk. Sirius hadn’t been full of morale to begin with, but it was his own fault for letting it taper off, and, as it turns out, laying in his sofa-bedroom at all hours outside of school, working up the courage to face his quasi-boyfriend is... ineffectual.

And he knows, knows in his heart and even at the very surface that he’s being _dramatic_ , yet still he gets to thinking _it’s been too long, I’ve waited too long, he probably doesn’t even remember my_ face _— oh, shit, do I remember_ his _face? —_ A calming breath _— Of course I do. Of_ course _I do._

But then it’s Ros who claws her way into his mind. _He doesn’t care about you_ — then Sirius thinks, _one plus one equals three_ … He nearly runs head-on into the closing door, buried in thought.

When he steps in, the auditorium is almost full, lights dimming. Sirius slips into the open aisle seat in the backmost row. There’s a man onstage giving introductions, voice resounding in the cavernous space, but Sirius is only squinting at the programme that’d been shoved into his hands on the way in, trying to make out the small text in the yellow glow of the stage and the peal of light pouring in from the cracked-open doors nearest him. There’s five performances until Regulus’; his is the very last of the night. Sirius slumps low in his seat, pulls his phone from his pocket. He feels the nasty glare sent his way by the lady beside him in a garishly-printed dress, and he merely gives her a side-eye, lowers the phone’s brightness, and pops the collar of his leather jacket. A quintet of young violinists launches into _Ode to Joy_. The tiny, white number in the red badge on the Messenger app goes from _17_ to _18_.

Sirius doesn’t breathe for a good five seconds. Thinks he might not even be able to until he tries and gulps in air like it’s oasis water in the desert. He taps it open.

And while he could scroll through every message Remus has sent since Friday night — _Saturday morning_ — he only has eyes for the most recent. A picture. Text in code.

He saves Remus’ picture to his camera roll.

It’s slow work, switching between his photo of their language and the newest message.

_Do u remember when I first let u down?_

_The first of many damned Wednesdays…_

_And what did u do?_

_When I came and found u?_

_U gave me a flower_

_by the hand of a bloody robot._

_Don’t think u’d do the same if I came and found u now_

_but I wish I’d kept that flower._

_I really, really wish I’d kept it_

Sirius peers through his eyelashes at the stage. It’s just in time for the eerie, swelling silence between the end of the song and the audience’s applause, at which he closes his eyes, pats his thigh a few times as not to feel like a totally shitty person.

A small, sandy-haired boy takes a seat at the piano once the quintet has made its exit. The first of Debussy’s _Arabesque_ s. He knows it from listening, two stories up, while Regulus played tirelessly in the parlour.

The flower. The sodding daisy from the measly excuse for landscaping under the Robotics lab window. What had Sirius done with that flower? Remus had tucked it into his shirt pocket when he’d swept from the room.

 _It’d fallen out_ , he remembers. _It’d fallen out_.

 _Fuck_.

Sirius’ elbow digs into the armrest, barely holding up his heavy head. Hair sifts in the way of his eyes. His toes curl with guilt, with dread, inside his boots. _I wish I’d kept it, too_.

Sirius must miss the applause, because before he knows it, a far-too cheery rendition of _The Blue_ bloody _Danube_ echoes through the auditorium. He feels like a pitifully ironic movie character; while yet another young boy plucks with precision at the keys, Sirius sits gloomily in the darkest area of the theatre, brooding over an encoded bittersweet message from his lover — _status in limbo_ — next to the most aggravating old bat in flower-power-wear.

His screen goes alight again. The sender would be just a number, had he not seared the digits into his eyes and brain and soul when he’d so frantically called it, shaking hands and all, Friday night. _Saturday morning. Whatever._

**_Hey, Sirius. It’s Ros. I was wondering if you’d heard from Remus. I haven’t seen him all week. Haven’t been able to get in touch with him or find him. Starting to worry. Any chance he’s with you?_ **

Sirius locks his phone and pockets it, digs his fingers into his eye sockets until the pressure starts to hurt and he’s seeing light sparks on release. He’s not seen Remus all week, either.

Some dipshit plays _My Heart Will Go On_ on cello. Sirius’ temples pulse painfully, like all the blood in his head’s rushed there, pounding its way out through his weakest spots. _Where are you?_ Then he thinks _why would I know? What authority do I have on Remus?_ but he isn’t sure if that’s him or Ros speaking. But Ros, Ros _now_ , would want him to know.

The cellist drags his hefty instrument offstage. From the wings, then, walks Regulus, tall, pale, and knobby-kneed with his dark, curling fringe swooping down to his eyelashes. When Sirius shifts to sit upright, he elbows his floral neighbour without apology.

He swears he hears it across the theatre when Regulus cracks his knuckles.

Sirius doesn’t recognise it, the song. It starts in slow, rising quartets of notes, ascending only to drop and ascend again, spectral in the silence, but sharp, like the sound of a glass being tapped with a fork. But Regulus has fast fingers. He’s only taunting. His other hand comes to life on the lower register, and the rise and fall tumble together into a warm, brisk melody. Sirius pitches headfirst into it.

_An owlish blink. ‘You think I’m suspicious?’_

_‘You’re a bit brilliant, aren’t you?’ said you, sparkle in the irises and all_.

 _Red lips and rosy cheeks._ Fuck. _It takes a person of a certain caliber to put such lyrics inside my head, doesn’t it?_

_But you did. You do._

_‘Yours,’_ said the first note. _About the lighter, my stupid dick lighter. But I_ was _already. I swear it, I was. Yours._

_And do you remember what I said to you? Right before I swear you might’ve kissed me in the greenhouse? I said… ‘Well, you’re not so bad.’_

_I’ve never loathed an understatement more._

_And when you say arsey things like, ‘I just think it’s cinematic…’ It’s meant to drive me off, you know?_

_But up I climbed._

_Onto your handlebars._

_And you drenched me with sprinklers._

_‘They can’t all be happy, Sirius,’ said you. ‘What if in one, we meet once in passing and then never again, because I die before fate can bring us together?’_

_Please don’t. I’ll_ kill _you, I’ll kill you if you die before fate does what it wants._

_Since I met you, you’re all I’ve been able to think about, said you. I could hardly believe it. And then you said:_

_‘If you were inside my head, you’d know, but you’re not…_

_‘So I can’t stop. I_ have _to keep telling you until you believe me.’_

_Said you._

He’s the first to rise and applaud when the delicate last notes of Regulus’ piece ebb into quiet, glass on glass, feathers on glass, then nothing.

A tear leaves a wet trail down the middle of his cheek. It detours around the crease of his nose, and then he tastes it on his upper lip, the salt of it.

He’s still clapping, his palms burning, when he notes his parents two rows down and across the aisle. His mother know he’s there; he can tell by the way her eyes keep flickering to their corners.

Regulus disappears into the wings. The lights go up. Mum’s eyes are hawkish, but Sirius is the first out the theatre doors, breathing fast and heavy and striding on a path he can’t possibly know but still hopes leads to the stage exit.

He turns the corner and collides with his brother.

“God, Sirius,” Regulus huffs, but Sirius takes him by the shoulders, hounding him closer to the wall. Then Regulus must get a better look at his face in the ugly fluorescent light, because: “Are you — _crying?”_

“Shut up,” mutters Sirius, glancing sideways as if their mother might materialise beside him at a moment’s notice. Then his eyes are trained again on Regulus. “That was brilliant.”

Regulus, half-tense, what with being crowded against the wall and all, manages a little smile. “Yeah?”

Sirius nods urgently.

Regulus hums, shrugs under the weight of Sirius’ palms. “It’s called _I Love You_. The song, it’s called that.”

There’s a sensation in Sirius’ chest — something like a hollowing, a crumpling, and then air, air being blown in until it’s filled and whole and warm again. He squeezes Regulus in a hug that’s too quick for him to return.

“I have to go.” He sniffs. Nods again. “Have to go, but — you smashed it, mate. Annihilated everyone in that room.”

Regulus’ brow disappears under his fringe, but there’s a humorous edge to his smile. “Thanks?”

Sirius chuckles, dry and scratchy in his throat, and unhands Regulus with the intention of turning down the hall. But he stops first and asks, “D’you remember what the three numbers are on the back of mum’s debit card?”

Regulus rubs his jaw in thought. “Eight nine oh?”

Sirius tousles the mop on his head, shoots off in a sprint down the corridor he’d come.

In the lobby outside the theatre, family and friends gather post-show in thick throngs, chatting in excitement. Sirius weaves between every obstacle, slipping into the nearest open spaces between him and the door. He smells his mother’s perfume when he passes her by. Dad’s back is turned, but Mum spots him, Sirius sees her spot him because he’s shoving backwards now, less than effective at getting him to his destination but all the more pleasing when he gets to lock eyes with his mother amidst a double-handed two-fingered salute.

He orders an Uber to the Tube stop.

Changes the card-to-bill to Mum’s debit card. _Just for this trip._

Or not.

**FRIDAY 19:59**

Sirius goes skidding out from between the sliding doors of the Tube. He only slows to avoid a woman pushing a pram and to get through the turnstiles in one piece. But once he's out in the cold air, blanketed under a heavy navy-clouded sky, he only runs.

The core of his chest is on fire, the tips of his ears feel like they're verging on frostbitten, and he's sweating through his shirt, the nice, satin buttoned one in an emerald shade — James had forced the orphaned shirt on him, claiming it brought out his olive undertones too much, whatever that means — that he'd thought might make up for the fact that he doesn't own any outer layers but his leather jacket.

The main doors to the school are locked. _Of course they are. Who the fuck's at school on a Friday night?_ But Sirius' panic eats at his rationale, and his gut sinks and twists the more he tugs at the immovable doors, knowing more force won't open them, knowing it'll be the very same no matter the entrance he tries.

He runs his fingers down the cool metal framing, sinks his forehead to it. It feels like ice. He wishes he had a crowbar. Or a hammer. _How did you do it, Remus?_ Sirius thinks of the debit card in his pocket. He tells himself it won't work before he tries to slide it between the door and its frame, just so he won't be that much less disappointed. _It's bolted to the floor and ceiling, genius_. With a cry of frustration, he stumbles backward, glare livid. Not livid enough to melt the doors.

Sirius scans the schoolyard. Open windows?

He feels like he'll be sick.

Clutching at his stomach through his top, he starts to walk the school's perimeter. Walk, until he runs, because the Robotics lab faces west and he's at least a 120-degree sector away. And the Robotics lab is where he's headed.

The window is cracked. The remnant of the daisy he'd snapped at its stem hugs the ground below it morosely. He pulls the window open further, peers inside ISAC's little room. _Oh, the strop the teacher would throw, knowing someone could break into the lab so easily._

Remus isn't anywhere in sight. Still Sirius scrambles in, hoisting up his weight and scratching his palms raw on the brick and bruising himself as he tosses his legs into the lab's side.

He's breathing fast as he clears his throat and utters, "Remus?" into the stillness.

Nothing.

“No,” he whispers, clutching at a table's edge for support, then pounding his fist into it. "Goddammit, no, no, _no_." Because if he'd thought he'd had an idea, he certainly doesn't now. Blood's still thrumming in his temples, pulsing angrily now, and he might claw his head open just to _let it free, for fuck's sake_.

Then he hears it.

It's nothing — a rustle of fabric on fabric, maybe.

Sirius circles ISAC's table, walking almost on his tiptoes. There, underneath the table Sirius had slumped over in melodramatics as he'd fended off Lily's friendship days ago, is the black shape of someone, curled in on himself, hood hiding what might've been the characteristic silhouette of his hair.

Sirius hears him sniff, feels his resolve crumble and pour out of him.

He falls to his knees, lays his hands to the tops of Remus' shoes.

"Remus," he whispers.

Remus lifts his head from his arms. He's holding something, something that smells earthen, scent filling the lack of sight. Then Sirius sees the glint of the moonlight, reflecting on glass walls, in the sheen of Remus' eyes. And the shape of the wilted daisy.

Remus doesn't meet his gaze, but Sirius can see that his eyelids flutter with the weight of the wetness washing over his eyes.

He wraps his fingers around Remus' hand, the one with the drooping flower. His skin is chilled. Sirius squeezes.

“Hey, I’m here,” he breathes, cups his hand betwixt Remus' knees to catch it when the next moon-swollen tears bead at Remus' chin and break away and fall. “You're not alone.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song Regulus was playing was, of course, RIOPY's _[I Love You](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GVxKHuaeegE)_... A mix of the original and [Lucas' beginning](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzH1bA-2ifw) from SKAM France (Spoiler warning for link if you haven't watched SKAM France!) :')


	10. Minute by minute

**SATURDAY 11:14**

Sirius couldn’t say how long he’s stood in the living room doorway, socked toes curled into the floor, joggers drooping off his hips, but the coffee in his hands has gone lukewarm. It’s bitter, anyway. Gil had made it that morning before he’d stumbled off, hand in hand with last night’s fling, to do whatever activity’s acceptable in the light of day with a one-night-stand-turned-two.

Remus’ back is toward him where he lays on the sofa bed, his hair flattened in parts and fluffed in others by a night of tossing and turning. He’s breathing soft, deep and steady at last, under the weight of Sirius’ blanket and two throws.

Sirius doesn’t think he got a proper hour of sleep all night; the second his eyes would slip shut, he’d twitch and they’d shudder open and he’d crane his arm out blindly to pat around for the warm presence of Remus beside him. More often than not, Remus would grumble _I’m still here_ and bat Sirius’ hand away. Sure, Sirius felt like a nuisance. But he was a comforted nuisance.

Sirius’ mug nearly slips from his hands when there’s a gentle rap on the front door. He checks that Remus doesn’t stir, then pads to the door. The knock is too careful to be a _Gil’s-forgotten-his-keys-but-managed-to-weasel-through-the-vestibule-to-get-back-in_ knock, so Sirius is wary as he twists the doorknob.

“Hi,” says Ros, pulling a black beret off her blonde head, wrapped in a trendy robe-like coat.

Briefly, Sirius is embarrassed about the off-white, once-white Pink Floyd shirt he’s got on, before deciding there are more important things. Instead of greeting her back, the first thing Sirius says, chest clenching and back pressing the door open for Ros, is, “Want coffee? It’s… cold.”

He thinks that gets a vague smile out of her, if unintentionally. “I’m alright, thanks.”

“Okay,” murmurs Sirius, almost to himself, and eases the door shut.

Ros’ boots squeak as she traipses down the hallway, stopping short at the doorway to the living room.

Sirius leaves his cold coffee in the kitchen and joins her there. “Did you… did you want me to wake him up?” he whispers. “So you can take him home?” He pinches at his lower lip, then lets it go. “Or to — to his parents’? I would’ve told them where he is, but I don’t —”

“Remus told them,” Ros says calmly. She’s taller, heightened by her block heels, and there’s a genuine softness about her eyes when she looks down at Sirius.

Sirius’ brows scrunch. “He did?”

“Mhm. They know he’s here.” Sirius is sure Ros is watching the way Remus’ side rises and falls with his even breaths. “And I think it’s good he’s here. I think he should stay, you know, unless he decides there’s somewhere else he’d rather be.”

Sirius isn’t watching Remus anymore. He pinches at his neck, right below his Adam’s apple, and clears his throat. “Oh.”

“Don’t look so surprised,” Ros says, still quiet, then turns from the doorway. “Can we sit?”

Sirius can’t quite turn off his surprise on command, but he nods faintly and motions toward the kitchen.

Ros pulls out a chair and takes a seat, sets her leather purse gingerly on the tabletop. Tentatively, Sirius makes more room for it, nudging his impractical coffee mug out of her way.

“So,” says Ros.

Sirius pulls his feet up on the chair, hugs his knees. “I figured this was coming.”

Ros’ eyes roll. She looks tired but amused. “I’m not going to raise my voice, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”

Sirius’ face crumples in a myriad of ways as he says, “I’m not — _afraid_ —”

Ros interrupts him, smiling wearily, looking older than just two years Sirius’ senior. “How is he?”

Sirius meets her eyes that time, shrugs his shoulders limply. “I took him home from the school. He’s been sleeping since. I don’t…” He rubs his thumb and forefinger over his eyelids. “Is there something I should be doing? Because I don’t…”

“He’ll tell you what he needs when he’s ready.”

Sirius’ gaze meanders to the floor. “I made some toast…”

“He’ll eat when he’s ready.”

Sirius’ brow pinches, but then Ros follows that with, “Trying to force it will get messy, trust me.”

Sirius thinks of Remus flinging buttered toast — the toast Sirius had then scarfed down himself when it’d gone cold and butter-soggy — in his face. “Ah.”

“Mhm.” Ros smiles, laying her chin to her knuckles. Into the ensuing silence, while Sirius stretches at a hole in the toe of his sock, feeling still like _there’s something I ought to be doing,_ Ros says, “Sirius…” and he lifts his head.

“I was harsh last weekend,” she murmurs. Sirius commends her for the steadiness of her eye contact, because he can’t quite match it himself. “When I told you off.”

Sirius clears his throat, aware that if he doesn’t, his voice will fail him. “You seemed…”

“I know,” says Ros. “I know. I was angry at you for things you couldn’t have known about. And I was panicking.” Her lips tug upward without joy. “You’d think that after all this time, I’d be over panicking. But I still do a bit.”

Sirius chews the skin off the end of his thumb. He can’t help but feel like none of this is news to him. “It’s okay —”

“What I said to you wasn’t okay,” sighs Ros, setting her hand on the table, further into Sirius’ side than her own, like she’s trying to reach for him. “What I said about… you being a whim. An obsession.”

Sirius wets his lower lip. He sees the street outside the furniture shop, street lamps flickering and shrouded in the intermittent, yellowy-darkness. Ros’ face, though, mainly. Her skin catching the yellow glow, eyes vicious as she told Sirius to stay away because he’d only make things worse. 

“If you’re sorry for that, or whatever, then fine, thanks, but —” he pinches his lower lip — “like, I don’t want to step on toes. Least of all Remus’. And I don’t want you to start retracting shit because you _feel bad,_ or something.” He sets his chin on his knee, lips quirking with hesitant faintness. “I can take it.”

Ros scoffs at him from across the table. That grabs his attention, at the least.

“Because I feel bad,” she echoes, red nails assuming a thoughtful scratch at her chin. “No, that’s… that’d be new. I’ve never taken anything back because I _felt bad_.” She smiles and Sirius raises an eyebrow. “No. I was harsh because I was panicking. And I lied, flat-out lied when I told you he didn’t care about you.”

Inevitably, Sirius looks again at the hole in his sock.

“He did. _Does_. It’s been a while since I’ve heard him talk about anyone the way he talks about you. Or look the way he does when he talks about you.”

Sirius’ head feels heavy, like the thickest fog has rolled in and the humidity’s skyrocketed and he can’t simply go about breathing it out.

“So I think he should stay here, if you’ll have him.”

Sirius’ eyes meander to the wall that separates them from the hall, the hall that separates them from Remus.

“But if you do, that means… responsibilities, Sirius.”

Sirius nods vaguely. _I’ll have him,_ he already knows, even though Ros’ nebulous answers to _what should I be doing?_ still wraps strings around his wrists and ankles and weighs him toward the floor, earth, water.

She’s misty-eyed when Sirius looks away from the wall. But she doesn’t get frantic and wipe at her eyes when Sirius spots her, only smiles, close-lipped and tremulous but needed and warm.

Sirius lowers his feet to the floor. The chair creaks as he angles it toward Ros. “Can I ask again,” he whispers, then coughs to clear his throat, though his volume remains like he’s breathing rather than speaking, “What should I do?”

**SATURDAY 12:02**

When Ros leaves, Sirius finds himself in the living room doorway again.

Remus has turned over so his face is visible, cheek mashed against the pillow, a tuft of his hair curving against the grain into his eyes.

A door creaks down the hall, and then a very shirtless, very neon-green-briefs-clad Gil is beside him. “Did whoever came by leave already?”

Sirius nods. Remus breathes deep; the sound of it fills the living room, or then Sirius’ ears are hypersensitive.

Gil leans closer, then, following Sirius’ gaze, and whispers so Sirius can feel a spray of spit on the shell of his ear, “Shouldn’t we wake him up?”

Sirius considers, but not really. He shakes his head. “Go shower, please.”

Gil can’t claim he doesn’t need it, so he wanders off.

_What should I do?_

_Be patient,_ said Ros.

Sirius eases down onto the mattress beside Remus, lays a hand to his hair, flattens it until he can see the tender skin of his scalp.

_Trying too hard to analyse him will drive you over the edge, especially at first._

**SATURDAY 15:03**

_But don’t play ignorant. Learning and understanding… it all has to start somewhere._

Sirius might have already — in an unjustifiably infuriated frenzy — skimmed the first few search results Google presents when he’d tapped _bipolar disorder_ into his phone a week ago.

But while he sits in the armchair, crammed against the wall to make way for the convertible sofa bed, with a half-drained mug of coffee — there’s a full one, untouched and gone lukewarm, on the side table nearest Remus’ head — he pores over forum after forum on his laptop. _Bipolar disorder and relationships. How to care for and cope with…_

The corners of his eyes detect movement when Remus sits up amongst the sheets.

Sirius slams shut his laptop with too much vigour. “Hi,” he breathes.

Remus looks at him, then through him, and rises. He’s in the clothes Sirius had found him in, but for his jeans, which he’s folded and refolded thrice. _Damn his mother for sheltering him from laundry practices._

The springs in the mattress whine and Remus’ bare feet are soft as he departs. The bathroom door, with its sticky lock, echoes down the hall.

Sirius slumps.

And when Remus comes back, looking just as he had when he’d gone in, hair in fifty directions, eyes puffy and tired and brow vaguely pinched, Sirius clears his throat.

_Ask him what’s on his mind… if he’s willing to answer._

“So how are… how’re you feelin’?” A grimace follows the question, because Sirius realises he sounds like James’ father _every time ever_ that Sirius had fled his family home to James’ house and been confronted in the morning by a well-meaning Monty Potter waiting with a fry-up in the kitchen.

Remus’ eyes pass over him. He snorts. “Tired.” Then he lays back down, drags the covers up.

Sirius leans back. Doesn’t relax, necessarily, just slumps into the contours of the armchair, listens while the irregularity of Remus’ breathing tapers off to a monotone, soft snore.

_It’s the first step to understanding him. Because researching might help, but he’s different. Everyone is. And you’ll learn him, bit by bit, maybe even to the point that you’ll anticipate his extremes. But understanding him means understanding that no amount of reading will make you perfect. Nothing will. But you’ll grow accustomed, after you make a few mistakes, step on his toes or tread too lightly, to feeling frustrated or disappointed. Mostly in yourself._

_But you can’t blame yourself. You can’t live like that._

**SATURDAY 19:59**

_You might feel powerless._

The drapes are open and Remus is up, blankets pulled over his lap. He’s been looking out the window into the rain for the past hour, and though he’s slept most of the day away, Sirius can see that the shadows under his eyes aren’t just a trick of the light. And behind his eyes, Remus’ eyes, Sirius can see he’s thinking, sees that his gaze isn’t so much hollow as muddled, like the water in a cup you’ve dunked a paintbrush in too many a time. He hates that he has an idea about what… about what he’s thinking about.

So Sirius perches on the edge of the sofa bed, turns on the TV, then _Netflix_.

He coughs quietly. “So I saw that, er, they put _The Grand Budapest Hotel_ on _Net_ —”

“Can you turn that down?”

When Sirius looks over his shoulder, Remus’ eyes are glacial. Sirius doesn’t even attach his focus to the way the TV is blaring, autoplaying the trailer for whatever new _Netflix_ original is gracing the homepage.

“Can’t even hear myself bloody think when that’s on.”

Sirius, still with his eyes on Remus, mechanically shuts off the TV.

Remus’ eyes roll away from him to the window again, losing their acidity and soaking in the raindrops running races down the windowpane.

Sirius leaves the remote at the foot of the bed, pads into the hallway where he sits, knees to his chest, against the wall… until Lily emerges from her room, laptop cradled to her chest, and begs him to fix her WiFi connectivity.

**SATURDAY 22:40**

Sirius watches the Wes Anderson movie on _Netflix_ with Lily once he’s debugged her WiFi issues, then heads out to the Tesco three blocks away, where he meanders the aisles, cringing at a display of the energy drinks James guzzles like water, debating the merits of the millionaire’s shortbread on offer, and mostly hunting down the practical food items on the list Lily had texted him.

He’s shuffling into the kitchen with a bag on each arm — one of them plastic, as not everything had fit into Gil’s Switchboard canvas tote — when he finds Remus rooting in the fridge. Remus turns abruptly at the sound of Sirius’ approach, knuckles going white on the refrigerator door. The oven’s on, and Remus has placed two pieces of bread on a baking sheet.

“Hi,” breathes Sirius, lowering the bags to the kitchen table.

“I was looking for… for cheese,” says Remus, who turns his head away toward the yellow glow of the fridge light.

Sirius hums, then roots around in the canvas bag for a block of cheddar cheese. He joins Remus by the counter, nudging the fridge door shut and offering him the cheese. Then he pulls two plates from the cupboard, the cheese grater from a drawer below, and tosses two more slices of toast on the baking sheet.

There’s a lapse in which Remus simply stares his way, but then Sirius proceeds to butter the bread and Remus takes it upon himself to grate a heaping of cheese for them both.

They eat across from one another, cross-legged on the sofa bed. Crumbs go everywhere. Subsequently, Sirius flaps the blanket like a dirty tablecloth once they’ve finished, muttering about vacuuming the next morning… perhaps. Remus gives him something achingly close to a smile as he lays back down. The rain hasn’t let up.

Sirius sheds his joggers, sits upright beside Remus’ prone form, covers them both in the blanket. He runs hesitant fingers into Remus’ hair, which he thinks could use a wash — _tomorrow, perhaps_ — and feels his chest constrict, like there’s walls pressing in on all sides of his lungs, when Remus glances up at him.

Sirius breathes in, out. Trains his eyes on the window, where rain glistens in dusky streetlamp light. Twists a lock of hair around his finger. “What are you thinking about?” he asks Remus. It comes out sounding… _characteristically awkward_.

Sirius thinks Remus’ huff is a laugh. “How very possible it is that I might be lactose intolerant.”

Sirius’ brows both lift and he gasps out a startling, chime-like giggle. “Oh no,” he mutters, graced with Remus’ half-smile when he peers downwards.

“Mhm.” Remus shifts, and then he’s got his face pressed to the side of Sirius’ thigh, an arm looped around his leg. “But I think it’s better than looking out that damn window and thinking bad things.”

Sirius tucks a tuft of Remus’ hair so it curls around the shape of his ear. “The toilet’s only a short run from here.”

“It’s the little things,” whispers Remus.

_Be there for him._

_Wherever he is, lost in his own mind, he’ll find his way out. Eventually._

_He’ll return to you._

**SUNDAY 21:00**

Remus showers in the morning. Sirius doesn’t worry, not at all, when he spends longer than twenty minutes in the bathroom, doesn’t fight his urge to burst in and check that Remus is upright and alive.

But he shuts Sirius out after, once he’s clean. Snipes at him, accuses him of _hovering_ and _not having anything better to do_ when Sirius attempts to fill the spot beside Remus in bed or offers Remus the extra avocado toast Lily made Sirius without knowing he loathes the texture of avocado.

So Sirius does his homework in the kitchen, and promptly flees to Lily’s bedroom when he thinks he catches the faintest sound of movement from the living room, desperate not to be in Remus’ way should he wander into the kitchen looking for… _I don’t know. Cheese?_

He and Lily sit in silence — she’s on the bed, two textbooks propped open on her lap, Sirius is on the carpet, sprawled on his stomach, as far from her heater as his laptop cord will let him be — until the sun goes down. It’s long enough to make bearable even the softly-playing eighties playlist Lily claims makes her most productive.

Lily’s — _his_ — radio alarm reads _21:00_ when Sirius tiptoes out of her bedroom to fill a glass with water in the kitchen. The living room is eerily silent, so Sirius takes a few breaths before he makes his way down the hall and peers in.

Remus is curled up under the sheets. The curtains are shut but the room is swathed in the warm glow of the lamp on the table opposite Remus’ side. Or… on Sirius’ side, he supposes, should he choose to now decide that they have _sides of the bed_.

Sirius approaches warily. He’s bone-tired from doing nothing at all and it’s only nine and the last thing he wants to think about is leaving for school tomorrow, though it’ll at least keep him from hovering compulsively at Remus’ bedside.

He perches on the sofa bed’s edge. There’s a neon pink sticky note encircled within the golden halo of lamplight on the table, one of the kind that Lily’s begun sticking to the fridge door with everyone’s chores for the week. She’s allocated yellow as Sirius’ color, with which he’s less than pleased.

Remus’ handwriting is distinct, even at a glance. Sirius snatches up the note.

It isn’t in code.

_I’m sorry I snapped at you._

_Please go to school tomorrow. Don’t worry about me._

_Let’s talk soon. Just not yet._

_xxx_

Sirius rubs a hand over his chin, sticks the note to the table’s surface, shucks off his joggers, and curls up at the furthest edge of the mattress from Remus.

It’s been only minutes, Sirius thinks in a drowsy state, when springs creak and warm breath fans the bones at the base of his neck and Remus curls an arm around his waist.

_Treasure the sweet moments._

_In the face of everything, they’ll shine brightest._

**MONDAY 16:52**

It gets hot in the night and they roll apart. Sirius slips out the door with Lily in the morning to go to school. Amaline doesn’t comment when all throughout Comp Sci, Sirius texts Gil under the table for status updates on Remus. By far his most irritating responses are _Still breathing_ and _Oh, no, he’s not here anymore, packed his bags and left half an hour ago saying he was on his way to Aruba,_ which Sirius believed for the whole three seconds before Gil followed the message with a kiss emoji.

But it’s been two hours since Gil’s last update despite Sirius serially spamming him. On their way home, Lily tells him not to worry, that Gil isn’t the most trustworthy news source in the first place, so when he steps through the threshold and marches into the living room, he can only be so shocked when he finds Gil and Remus cross-legged on the floor in front of the telly, head-to-head in a game of Mario Kart.

Gil side-eyes him. “Now, you may not have noticed, Remus, but Sirius has just entered the room, and he’s like a siren with this shit, I swear to fucking god, he’ll wheedle and wheedle ’til you give in to letting him play you, only so he can turn the speed up to 150cc and spank the ever-living shit out of you as _Baby Daisy_ —”

Sirius’ eyebrows are far up his forehead. He shakes his head slowly and he can’t deny Gil’s warnings, but all he’s got eyes for is Remus’ grin as he crosses the finish line in second place — he’s playing Toad — and Gil is only starting his third lap.

“Baby Daisy, hm?” are Remus’ first words to him since the morning prior, and they’re accompanied by the most warm-molasses smile that Sirius has to lean against the wall.

He licks his lips.

Gil is an awkward divide between them while he focuses on at _least_ beating out King Boo, who’s in twelfth place — the kind of wee, burbling water trap that’s meant to keep you from your hole-in-one in crazy golf.

“Yes!” hisses Gil, lifting his controller in the air.

Sirius clears his throat. “Did you… did you eat?” he asks Remus, rolling onto and off the balls of his feet… wary of a knee-jerk reaction.

Remus smiles faintly as Gil juts a thumb at the pizza box on the carpet behind them, flanked by two greasy plates. “Too much,” mutters Gil, at the same time as Remus’ lips quirk at one side and he says, “I’ll clean those up.”

Sirius’ chest lurches. He presses his hands to the wall behind him, pins them there by his tailbone. He opens his mouth, perhaps to make a joke about lactose intolerance, his brain isn’t quite there yet, when Lily startles him by materialising promptly at his side.

“Gilderoy, come help me chop soup veg in the kitchen,” she says.

Gil grimaces. “There are so many things wrong with what you just said.” He rises anyway. Only when he passes close enough by Sirius does he notice a glint of metal through the mesh of Gil’s shirt — a nipple ring? He doesn’t have time to comment on it, though, as Remus is on his feet, hands in the pockets of his joggers, just a few feet between them.

Sirius looks between his eyes. “Hey.”

Remus half-smiles. “Hey yourself.”

Sirius’ fingers gravitate outward of their own will, skimming the tips of Remus’ until Remus takes it upon himself to lace them together.

Remus clears his throat, then. “I’m sorry about yesterday.”

Sirius shrugs, wrinkles his nose. “It’s fine.”

“It isn’t.”

Sirius blinks. “But… it is.”

“No,” breathes Remus, and then he’s encasing Sirius’ hand in both his own, a warm clamshell around his cold, dry knuckles. “Don’t just say that.”

Sirius smiles without humour. “I’m… not. It just _is_ …” He shrugs. “Okay.”

“Sirius…” Remus releases his hand. It dangles sadly by Sirius’ side. Remus schleps over to the sofa, which has been inelegantly folded _back_ into the shape of a sofa, covers spilling out between the cushions. He sits on the very edge, elbows on his knees, and Sirius takes a seat beside him, closer than he’s felt allowed to sit the past few days.

While Remus stares at the carpet, Sirius nudges him in the side with his knuckles. “What is it?”

“You know I don’t want this to have to be your life, right?” says Remus, empty.

“What —”

“Just shut up for a bit, please,” Remus tells him evenly.

Begrudgingly, Sirius obeys. He spreads his legs a bit, just so the curve of his knee brushes Remus’ thigh. Remus keeps his eyes ahead, though, no matter how much Sirius tries to reach for him and grasp onto his threads without physically doing so.

“You can’t forgive me for everything,” Remus murmurs, chin in his hand now. “But I also can’t… I also can’t apologise for everything I do.” Sirius watches the gentle curve of Remus’ eyelashes as he shuts his eyes. “I’d never shut up,” he adds in a whisper.

“I have —” Remus rubs at the bridge of his nose — “this very real fear that I’ve entrapped you. And you don’t notice because you’re _good_ , Sirius, and you think you can handle this, you think you _want_ to try and handle this, and I… I just want you to see you aren’t really trapped. You don’t have to handle this.” All he sees is the back of Remus’ head, then, when he looks toward the window. “Me.”

Sirius is halfway through the breath he needs to speak when Remus shakes his head. “You haven’t seen the half of it,” he says, angling himself abruptly toward Sirius. His eyes are hollow as he looks at Sirius, but not into him. “I snapped at you. I did something stupid and embarrassing. I talked about… about things no one should. Not in that way, at least. And I cried. Blubbered like a bloody baby.” He runs his tongue along his lower lip. “It’s like that, Sirius. Often. And I can’t control it. I would if I could. It’s like that, and sometimes it’s better, but sometimes it’s worse. Sometimes it lasts longer. Sometimes I’ll say something that hurts you or blame you for things I shouldn’t or I’ll catch _you_ when you’re in a shitty mood and I’m fucking _flying_ and it’s —” Remus’ eyes are watery, not with tears but with an enervated, lifeless wilt, and then he smiles and his voice cracks and it’s — “er, it’s rarely ideal.”

“Rarely anything is,” Sirius says quietly.

Remus listens. Or doesn’t, then says, shaky, “The last thing I want is to hurt you.”

Sirius scoots closer, letting the dip between the sofa cushions swallow him, if only because it’s closer to Remus. “We have that in common, you know.” He lifts his chin, scanning Remus’ face. “I don’t want to hurt you either.”

Remus rolls his eyes. “But —”

“You haven’t trapped me,” Sirius states, then reconsiders. “Well, not in the sense you think you have.” His lips curl as he touches Remus’ hip, fingers gentle. _Trapped a little piece of my soul in yours, perhaps._ “But I… I don’t want to hurt you. And, yeah, I was a bit hurt yesterday when you got all stroppy, but I got over it.” His fingers form a fist around the thick material of Remus’ jumper. “Do you remember when you pulled me out of Comp Sci? And I brought up my mum? In that…” He sighs. “In the wrong way? I hurt _you_.” His brows are creased. “I know that now. And I’m sorry. So…” He touches Remus’ chin with light fingers. “You’re not safe from me, either.”

Remus makes something of a snort. “That’s not the same. You don’t know that everything’ll work out —”

“I don’t care,” breathes Sirius, almost shuddering with the emptying of his lungs. “I don’t care. I have to deal with you, you have to deal with me.” His eyes flicker away, brain abuzz. “I _want_ to deal with you,” he states, soft, finding Remus again, “if you want to deal with me, too.”

Remus is silent a moment. Then, “That’s a terrible deal you’ve struck.”

“Why?” Sirius harrumphs, curls fingers into Remus’ shoulder, needing to feel him for real after hours, days without. “ _I think_ it’s a bargain. All I have to do is love you. Comes easily.”

Remus gives him another look, this one longer, heavier, quieter somehow, breathlessly parted lips and all. Sirius, sunken into the couch, appearing and feeling far too comfortable until he realises his Freudian slip. Logically, he only coughs and sits upright, diving decisively headfirst through the almost palpable air between them. “I have an idea,” he says, bouncing off the edge of the sofa. He stands a few feet from Remus, in the very middle of the living room, hands on his hips and eyes on the analog clock on the wall. It’s a hideous, kitschy cat-shaped clock, one where the poor creature’s tail swings like a pendulum.

Gil’s contribution to the home decor, obviously.

“No, _Remus_ , Remus Lupin, I don’t know that everything will work out,” says Sirius, eyes glued to the clock as the second hand crawls its way toward _12_ again. “But I don’t want to… I don’t want to sit around, thinking _oh, perhaps I’ll fret now in case tomorrow, Remus decides to purchase a strip club with my mother’s inheritance_ —” He pauses. “Well, that wouldn’t be the worst thing, but not the point, not the point — or _let me not snog Remus right now in case I bomb my exam later and come home in a fit_ or _let me not be_ here _with you and enjoy it because you might be down for the rest of the month and I can’t predict it._ ”

Remus looks at him like he’s off his rocker.

Sirius scratches his chin. He’s talked about _love_ and now he’s pacing the room, eyes not leaving the cat clock.

He very well might be.

“You know what I want to do instead?”

Remus’ eyes, at least, betray vague amusement now. “What, Sirius?”

“Take it day by day.”

Remus’ brow lifts.

Sirius strides over to him, palming his shoulders. “No, we can do better. Minute by minute.”

Remus touches his elbow, squeezes. _It’s a start_.

Sirius sighs. The minute hand’s gone around once, and it ticks toward _12_ again. “And… we start… _now_.” When the hand hits twelve, he sags into Remus’ lap, wrapping him in his arms, cradling his head to his chest. The way Remus laughs, it sounds like can barely breathe, but he’s still clutching Sirius by the waist as they roll onto their sides, clutching one another for warmth and need and the ache of longing and, on one side, perhaps for love.

Sirius breathes in Remus’ hair, squeezes his eyes shut tight enough to spark his vision, fists the back of his jumper. Remus drags him in by the bum like a good lad so Sirius doesn’t roll right off the sofa.

Sirius cracks an eye open to check the cat clock. He thinks it’s been more than a minute, but still he says, “That one went rather well.”

From below, Remus peers up at him, chin boring a hole in Sirius’ sternum. “You think so?” he whispers.

Sirius shrugs. “Yeah. Got you to touch my arse, didn’t I?”

Remus simply smiles, crooked and canine-toothy, and burrows back into Sirius’ chest. His hand, blessedly and protectively, sprawls over Sirius’ clothed bum. _“Minute by minute,”_ mutters Remus. “Where the hell did you get that from?”

**FRIDAY 19:13**

“Alright, alright, everyone out of the way, out of the fucking way, _Christ_ , my eyes _hurt_ watching you fools,” Benjy hollers.

Sirius, presuming this is explicit permission to drop the pile of sticks in his arms and abandon responsibilities, does so, and holds up his hands in surrender.

“Get out of here, mate, you’ll literally impale yourself,” mutters James, who’s spent the last quarter of an hour attempting to assert dominance over their collective failure of a bonfire. “Now, Pete, you put yours there —”

“I was a scout for _two years,_ Jamison!”

“When you were eight, you massive _shit_.”

Sirius backs away. Slowly.

Lily and Marlene are getting stoned outside the greenhouse, faces aglow in the light of their phone screens, passing to and fro a bottle of wine.

Sirius sits down in front of them.

“Making headway on the bonfire, I see,” says Lily. She has a hat with a fox’s face and two oversized bobbles on it tugged down over her ears.

Sirius sighs, crosses his arms over his knees. “See, when you brought it up, James seemed _so_ confident…”

“So you’re saying to never trust Potter. Got it.”

Sirius smiles to himself. _Not with anything but your darkest secrets._ Over his shoulder, he sees that James has been able to fend Benjy off and the arrangement of sticks and twigs has gained at least half a foot in height. Benjy’s wandered over to Mary, is helping her get her second layer on. She’s brought two carafes filled with hot mulled wine, and the thought of a cup is the only thing keeping Sirius from freezing solid in his typically few layers.

“Here,” Lily says, holding the joint toward Sirius. 

Sirius stares, skeptical.

“What?” huffs Lily. “Take it. You need it. You look pitiful without Remus by your side.” She smiles sympathetically. “Which you shouldn’t, by the way. He’s only gone home. He’ll be fine with his parents. And you’d want to see your son after a depressive episode, wouldn’t you?”

Sirius snorts, tempted to say _I don’t have a son,_ but instead he looks at the joint still dangling between Lily’s fingers. “S’just that I can’t smoke more of your weed, Evans, without thinking of the sixty quid price on my head.”

Lily blinks, holds his gaze long enough for Marlene to snatch the joint from her fingers. “Oh,” Lily breathes, and then, “ _Ooooooh._ Oh, Sirius.” A soft laugh. “It was — oh, dear. When I was moving in and cleaning up your room, I found, er, found my pot between the mattress and the frame of your bed.” Her eyes bat rapidly, her round, green eyes, like she’s worried she’s hurt him gravely for withholding _important_ information. “It was mine, ‘cos… had my hair clip on the bag and everything. So whatever shit you smoked back in September, it was _not_ mine.”

Sirius thinks of the empty baggie on the floor of the Potters’ attic. “It wasn’t?”

“No.”

Sirius narrows his eyes, rubbing a hand over his chin in thought. He gazes into the darkness, the distant, cold black of the night beyond the sheen of LCD screens and the moon. “So you _hoodwinked_ me into thinking I owed you my presence at the useless greenhouse meeting.”

Lily smiles, suddenly giddy, focus somewhere past Sirius’ shoulder. “Obviously I didn’t know at the time, Sirius.”

“Was it that useless?”

Sirius’ head whips about. The chilled-pink tips of his ears catch the wind when he does. 

James’ victorious holler coincides with the moment that Sirius locks eyes with Remus, there, _here_ in an oversized coat and a thick scarf that grazes his earlobes. Orangey flamelight crawls over one side of his face; beyond him, a modestly-sized campfire blazes. Or — _bonfire_. Sirius has a feeling James would be truly hurt if he nomered it of the camp variety.

Sirius is on his feet, hands dirtied on cold, damp ground in the process. “Why aren’t you at home?” he murmurs, stepping toward Remus.

“You do realise you mightn’t’ve even met me had you not gone to that _useless greenhouse meeting_.”

Sirius chews on his lower lip. Not smiling is hard as he steps toe-to-toe with Remus, eyebrows halfway up his forehead. “Are we going to do that thing? The thing where we both ignore one another’s questions as if we’re having two separate conversations?”

Remus smiles, crinkly-eyed, and takes Sirius by the cheeks with gloved hands. It’s so briskly warming that Sirius goes limp. “I missed you,” Remus whispers.

Sirius’ lips tug up. His fingers find their way into Remus’ coat pockets, and it’s where they’ll stay, he decides. “I missed you.” And as Remus kisses him on the forehead, Sirius adds, “But I think your parents still do.”

“They can wait a day,” mutters Remus into his skin, and then Sirius is bracketed in Remus’ arms, sinking into his being and his warmth, the furthest depth of the night. “Talking to my parents is hard.” Fingers at the base of Sirius’ neck, clumsy and scratchy in their glove swaddle. “Loving you’s easy.”

Sirius’ swallow is caught in his throat and he’s glad he’s so close, face between Remus’ neck and shoulder, because he couldn’t hold eye contact if he tried. He snorts a soft laugh. “I’m... I’m embarrassing,” he whispers.

“Yeah.”

He squeezes Remus around the waist, puts his full weight into it so fast that he has to depend on Remus to keep them upright when they stumble.

“Christ,” Remus laughs.

Sirius is unashamed now. It’s too late to not be, his _everything’s_ out on the line. “How do you feel?”

“Mulled wine!” calls Mary.

Remus hums. “I’m feeling mulled wine.”

“That’s not an answer.”

For a moment, Remus draws away to gape at him, so distraught that Sirius’ first floundering thought is, _oh no, how will I get my everything off this line?_

But then Remus tweaks his nose and leaves him in a rush of cold to the negative imprint of his body heat, grinning and jogging toward Mary’s beckoning.

Sirius stays where he’s left. Dorcas is there now, handing a cup of mulled wine to Marlene. Peter and James sit basking in the fire’s halo, and Lily inserts herself between them rather comically. And Remus — Remus has a steaming cup in each hand as he stumblingly sidesteps a now desperately lip-locked Mary and Benjy on his way back to Sirius.

_Wherever he is… he’ll find his way out._

_He’ll return to you._

_He did, Ros. He did._

_And he will._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All I have to say is... if you've made it this far, you have my whole heart. <3 Thank you for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on [tumblr](https://bringblackback.tumblr.com) :)


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